The Big "?"

For the second leg of the race, you'll be heading to Queensland...

2011-11-27T20:58:00.022+11:00

Our second stop of the trip was the one I was most excited for: Far North Queensland. It's a beautiful spot that holds many great memories and adventures, having living in Port Douglas for more than four months back in 2007. I've been anxious to revisit our former home to see how fast things might have changed. We also had a trip booked to snorkel the Great Barrier Reef (a must-do!) and rented a car so we could drive into the leafy wilderness of Daintree National Park. It promised to be a great couple of days.

We were also hoping to find a little more sunshine and heat up in the north, after our previous day in the cold and wet Blue Mountains. Well, we got our wish. As soon we stepped off the plane, a steaming wall of humidity hit us. We stepped out onto the tarmac in Cairns, surrounded by sugarcane fields and lush green hills under dark blue rainclouds. Somehow the colours are all a little deeper in the tropics -- maybe it's the sunlight? Right away I felt like I'd returned home.

We made a brief stop through Cairns, zooming past the big Captain Cook doing his Hitler-esque salute in our rental car, and like that, we were in the centre of town (smaller than I remembered!). We took a stroll down the boardwalk along the seashore, and I remembered why I steered us away from getting a hotel in Cairns - the massive unsightly tidal mudflats, that sleepy yet mildly rough vibe, and souvenir junk shops at every turn. (Probably with some interesting history though: after our first trip to Australia, my great uncle Alan told me some great tales about his backpacking experiences in Cairns back in the 1960s, when Cairns was just a tiny mining and fishing outpost at the end of the railway line. There were so few places to sleep that he had to take turns sharing a bunk with the miners, who worked all night and slept by day!)

What Cairns did have was plenty of al fresco restaurants serving beer and thin-crust pizza -- perfect on a hot day. With full bellies we set off on the winding oceanside road north to Port Douglas, stopping nearly every five minutes for another look at the insanely gorgeous views of the Coral Sea from beaches and cliffs.We finally reached the turn-off to Port Douglas, familiar territory with its jungly main road and blue-footed scrubfowl pecking about under the roadside palms. We arrived at the Sheraton, an stunning tropical paradise of a hotel (albeit with interior decorating that's a wee bit '80s), with a swimming pool that flowed under footbridges, around palm trees, and stretched around about 6 different hotel buildings! We settled in, checked out the hotel grounds a bit (we got lost there more than a few times!). Later we ended up on Port Douglas's main street, which was pretty much as it was when we left in 2007, with many of the same restaurants and bars still around, and a few new additions.

The next day was our reef trip, which we booked with Port Douglas's reef trip juggernaut, Quicksilver, for the main reason that they have a massive multi-storey platform built out on the reef, so my mom could check out the reef from outside the water, and my dad and I could snorkel it up. When we arrived at the platform, they recommended at this time of year we wear lycra "stinger suits" for snorkelling, to avoid deadly jellyfish stings (and a few had been spotted here and there), so we paid the $5 while my mom laughed at us in our head-to-toe black spandex suits that even had hoods and mittens. My mom went off into one of the 'semi-submersible submarines' (like a skinny glass-bottomed boat that sits low in the water) and we hopped into the water... it was beautiful. We weren't sure if the coral would be really damaged thanks to daily snorkel trips, but there was so much life - coral and fish - and colours everywhere. One guy saw a shark, but unfortunately (?) we missed it. We saw a couple of turtles from the sub, and a big cuttlefish, which was cool. My highlight was a bunch of clownfish and their babies, hiding in a sea anemone. I was the last one out of the water in the afternoon when the ship honked its horn for everyone to come in.... it was so great to explore the Reef again!

Our third day up in FNQ was a road trip day, and we took the car north all the way to Cape Tribulation, to the end of the road for cars, at least (it's where the 4WD track starts up Cape York). We checked outthe ancient Daintree Rainforest, taking a crocodile-spotting cruise on the murky Daintree River -- unfortunately not seeing any crocs, as we learned they're harder to spot at high tide (strike one) and don't sun themselves on the riverbanks so much in the summer (strike two), but we did see some cool birds and plants, and learned all about the mangroves. We also stopped at incredible Cape Trib beach (sadly my parents aren't as big beach bums as I am... I could've stayed there all day!), ate strange fruit ice cream at the Daintree Ice Cream Company, and wandered through the jungle boardwalks in search of wildlife. My dad provided the mosquito bait as he ran ahead through the boardwalks, while my mom and I hung back and inspected odd-looking spiders and noises in the bushes. It turns out, she is a bit of a lizard whisperer, and lured out all kinds of crazy reptiles along the trails on our trip. No cassowaries this time (maybe I got everyone's hopes up too much after my previous encounter?) but well, there are only about 1200-1500 left in the wild in Australia. And you really have to take things at a more leisurely pace to see these creatures....

Sydney... Whirling Around Oz Part 1

2011-11-23T09:18:00.008+11:00

We're probably somewhere above a schoolies party on the northern New South Wales coast as I write this, as we flee the grey skies and pouring rain of the Sydney spring, hoping to trade it for a little sunshine and tropical heat in Cairns and Port Douglas, Queensland.

It's hard to believe I'm spending the next two weeks hopping around Australia on jets and rental cars with my parents, who I haven't seen in eight months (but honestly doesn't feel like more than about three weeks). It's a bit of effort to visit Oz from Canada, and so when they started to mention that they were thinking, sort of, as a possibility, of maybe taking a trip out here sometime this year, I didn't think it would happen so fast. It was the next day when I got an email from my dad, telling me the flights were booked. That was the middle of September.

So after a couple months of sniffing out domestic flight deals, booking cars, snorkel trips, and planning a whirlwind two-week itinerary to see as much as possible, we all met in the Sydney airport on Sunday morning, a little bleary-eyed (them from the long flight across the Pacific, me from spending the day before at the beach and spending all night packing....) but we got right into it. No time to waste! Within a few hours, we'd wandered Sydney's CBD, lunched on pies, snapped photos of old churches, marvelled at the plants in the Botanic Gardens, and reached the harbour and the Opera House. Now, I've only been to Sydney twice, and it's always exciting, but it's just so fun to travel with people who are seeing a new country for the first time-- things I'm starting to take for granted a little (but still think are pretty cool), like the ibises in the park, the bats in the trees, the massive plants and the sounds of rainbow lorikeets flying overhead-- all those things that amazed my parents on our first day are the exact same things that made me totally excited to be in a new country.

On the flip side, there's also the hefty Aussie prices for coffee and food, which I'm well used to, but comes as a bit of a shock when you first land (I think we're starting to shake that a bit, as a $3.50 coffee is now what we consider a "good deal"-- in Canada a regular Tim Hortons coffee is just over $1). I do remember spending my first few days in Melbourne eating "Fantastic" brand cheesy instant noodles and fearing we'd never go out for a meal at a restaurant. Ancient history now!

We've done lots of great stuff already in our first three days in Oz-- in fact, plenty of things I'd never done because I was already kind of a local by the time I travelled the country, and possibly too much of a cheap backpacker, too-- like a tour of the Sydney Opera House which was pretty awesome, dinner around Darling Harbour, taking the Scenic Railway in the Blue Mountains, and of course, crashing in hotels, rather than a tent, van, or hostel.

On our second day, we met up with my parents' old friends, the Isbisters, whom they had met on a bus tour of Europe in the 1970s and had been in touch since (they visited Canada a few times since, but had so far been unable to convince my side to visit Oz). Keith & Ena took us all around the north part of Sydney, to beautiful beaches and lookouts around Manly, Curl Curl, Collaroy, and Mosman. Later we cruised around the harbour on the city ferries (best harbour cruise deal in town!), walked the Harbour Bridge, and dined on pancakes in The Rocks. And yesterday, we took a train out to Katoomba in the Blue Mountains, only to find the iconic Three Sisters cloaked in a THICK fog. We walked around the rainforest below, hoping the fog would clear (spotting an elusive -so says our guidebook- lyrebird for the first time in my Oz travels!), but no luck. We returned to the top of the cliffs via the insanely steep and rollercoasterish Scenic Railway, only to find we couldn't even see to the opposite side of the parking lot to find our bus... the fog was that dense. It was suggested to go check out the nearby Leura Cascades, which flowed right beside a pathway and would be easy to enjoy, even in fog, and we were halfway down the trail when the misting rain became a downpour and soaked us and the pathway... we dodged huge puddles on the way back up and had to, just four hours after arriving there, unfortunately give up on the Blue Mountains, which were more like White Mountains that day (not that we could even really see a mountain!). And so my parents learned (and I relearned) the power of the Australian weather to completely alter carefully laid-out plans...

And so, onward we go, first to Far North Queensland, then to Uluru (if Qantas doesn't strike again and ground us!), Melbourne, and back to Sydney, where Adrian will meet up with us. It's a pretty full-on schedule and we're realizing we probably can't do everything we want to do (or visit everyone we want to see) but it's definitely fun to do a family road trip all over again so many years on! -Dayle

The Icing on our New Zealand Cake: Franz Josef Glacier

2011-11-10T20:04:00.003+11:00

[Oct 12 & 13, 3011] When we booked ourselves in for a full-day hike up Franz Josef Glacier, we had a good feeling it would be a pretty exciting day. We actually extended our trip for it, as it sounded like an absolute must-do, but still we cursed the seemingly endless five-hour drive from Queenstown, through low clouds and driving rain (the west coast of the South Island is notoriously rainy, which is actually how the glaciers continue to replenish themselves), along dangerous winding roads and mountain passes. We arrived at Franz Josef Village, a tiny little settlement no more than two streets wide and two streets long, on the rainy evening of October 12, ate a quick dinner in our hostel's kitchen, and went to bed early, hoping the next day would turn out a little nicer.

Lucky for us, it was blue skies over Franz Josef Village the next morning. We headed over to Franz Josef Glacier Guides for our guided hike at 9:15am and they bundled us up in a lot of wintry waterproof gear that seemed pretty unnecessary on this sunny and springlike morning. Goretex jacket, rain paints, well-loved boots (Dayle opted for her own hiking boots after sticking a foot in and feeling a 'squish'), crampons, and a fanny pack to carry them in. Apparently the weather changes fast, and the guides said it would likely rain by the afternoon. The whole operation had the air of going out on a scuba dive. Soon we were on a converted school bus (that smelled like wet winter boots) with our guides George and Jess to take us the short drive to the base of the valley, where we would start the trek in the rainforest. Now, normally we don't take the organized tour route, but in this case we decided that it was better to see the glacier with someone who understands the ice, and to help us get high up into all that pretty blue ice that there are in fact, no trails to, and is off-limits to independent hikers. And were we ever glad, it turned out, to be with someone who knew what they were doing up on the mountain!

The group split into two once we reached the flat, rocky floor of the valley, and we chose to join "faster" group with George, an impish bearded Kiwi guy who'd been leading hikes up the ice for four years already and said "Sweet as!" a lot (a unique Kiwi expression translating to "Awesome!"). George had a plan to dash with us up the glacier to pass the group that had embarked at 8:15am, and then to head up as high as we could. Our group of about 11 twenty and thirty-somethings were keen to make the most of our day, and George made sure we worked for it, while teaching us all about the geology and weather conditions that created such a crazy piece of landscape. First came the steep zigzagging climb up atop layers of loose rock covering the glacier ice, and it was nearly an hour before we reached the start of the bare ice. A quick lesson on how to put on our crampons -- spiked metal "shoes" that reminded me of mini bear traps -- over our boots, and another lesson on how to walk with crampons on-- "like John Wayne", with feet slightly apart, so as not to tangle oneself up, and with bent knees for stability-- and we were off. It was surprisingly warm under the sun, and soon we were carrying more clothing layers than we were wearing. The clouds started to roll in eventually from the ocean, as our guides predicted, and by the time we stopped for lunch, it had gotten quite chilly and overcast.

John Wayne!

We climbing through the light rain that rolled off our Goretex jackets and rain pants, and would look down every so often and realize how much distance we'd covered. You lose total perspective on distance while climbing glaciers (or mountains), and George would point out waterfalls falling down the cliffs beside us that were hundreds of metres high (perhaps thousands?). There was a snowy part we could see at the top of the glacier that we were positive we'd reach in no time at all, but apparently it was too far for any climber to reach in a day. The ice formations we walked through and over were ever-changing and incredible, and no matter how tired our legs got, we all were happy to keep going.

Misty glacier

George and a cool ice tunnel

Finally, around 3pm, it was time to turn around and start the trek back down. George radioed back and forth with his fellow guides scattered around the glacier to try and figure out the best way down, and we were just getting ready to set off when we heard a rumbling and a huge crash.... we looked to our right (in the direction of the valley) and watched as a MASSIVE chunk of rock/dirt/trees/grass detached itself from the cliff face around Roberts Point and fell into the valley below-- the place where we were meant to trek down through to get back to Franz Josef Village.

Now, all day, there had been "little" rocks breaking off and falling down the cliffside around Roberts Point (little probably being the size of a car, but looking much, much smaller in the immense landscape) and while us hikers were like "Whoa! That's crazy!" George would respond, "Come on, that's not very impressive," and crack a joke (perhaps not really joking) that the mountain could do much better than that.

A little dash of excitement

So how else does a glacier guide and his merry band of hikers respond? Well, a round of high fives was in order. There we all were, high-fiving and "whoa"-ing and cheering when ANOTHER chunk of the mountain, this time even bigger, falls off in what felt like slow motion, and the valley below is a giant dust cloud that's going nowhere. And that's when George says, "I think we might have to call a helicopter..."

And that was when the group went from high-fiving to air guitaring and jumping up and down and shrieking, and various other gestures of joy. I don't know if the actual danger of the situation (which may have been over anyway) actually ever registered with any of us, for the excitement of getting a free helicopter ride far overshadowed any kind of fear one could possibly have.

So while George and Jess got out their ice picks and carved a big flat landing pad on the ice, there wasn't much we could do, except try and not fall over, as we'd been told to remove our crampons and suddenly it was incredibly hard to stand up (especially while jumping around in excitement). We were divided up into groups of six, given some instructions for boarding, and waited until a tiny speck hovered up out of nowhere (remember that scene in Cliffhanger? Yup.) and landed on the glacier. The first group was off and a moment later, another helicopter appeared to take our group.... and with so much excitement for the way-too-short ride down (which I remember as being really loud, and a really strange feeling in flight) I probably didn't take it in as much as I would've liked to. But we landed, safe and sound, with tired legs (but not as exhausted as if we had to walk all the way back down!) and with stories to tell in the sunshine that had re-emerged. That night we'd meet other people from our group in town, or in the Glacier Hot Pools (a lovely man-made maze of pools where you can sit in steaming water under lush rainforest ferns) and we'd try again and again to process what an insane day it was. [We learned later on that the rocks loosen up in the springtime melt, but no group had been airlifted out for at least three years or more, that being when there was a flash flood]

***

From there, our trip went on for a few more days, driving back to Queenstown at warp speed, in order to get the rental car back in time; a few nights at a very comfy hotel with a mountain/lakeview balcony and a "pillow menu" (and it was a steal on Wotif.com); more rugby on TV; more awesome food; and gave paragliding a try.... after our original outing was cancelled due to winds the Tuesday before, we just had to wait out a brief snow flurry before we could run off a cliff and float into the valley near Queenstown -- something that was at least as much fun (if not more?) as a helicopter ride, and lasted a lot longer in the open air.

If you've read all of these blogs about our New Zealand adventures, you'll probably start to get what we're really trying to say: it's an amazing place. So get over there, post haste, before the rest of the world figures that out. And if you're still needing a little more inspiration, feel free to check out our many photos and videos. Sweet as!

***

[Check out our New Zealand photos and videos here]

[Check out more photos of our Franz Josef adventure here]

Sandflies, Mountains, Rugby, and Sleeping Seals... A Few More NZ Adventures

2011-11-05T18:07:00.117+11:00

[Oct 8-11, 2011] Dunedin was a cute town to stay in, but we had a schedule to keep, so the next morning we continued on, but before we left town checked out Baldwin Street, the world's steepest street. It might be something of a quietly-kept secret, as none of us were previously aware that Dunedin was home to the world-record setting steep street, but it didn't disappoint. We parked at the very bottom of (the flattest part) and watched tiny, ant-like tourists climbing up what looked like one of those Hot Wheels ramps for toy cars from the '80s. We all happily admitted we were far too lazy to try walking it ourselves, but got a taste of what was probably the world's second-steepest street, later on in Queenstown (but more on that later).

Our original road trip plan had us tracing the southern coast all the way around to Te Anau, a bit inland, taking in the Catlins and Invercargill along the way. But as we'd just spent the last three days almost entirely in the car, we decided to cut quickly across the island to Te Anau and allow for an extra day to relax in Queenstown, where Stephane and Jenny visited not long before and found to be lovely. Note to anyone planning a driving exploration of New Zealand: it may look like short drives on a map, but it's best to take it slowly and allow yourself the time to enjoy the sights outside of the car! That said, the daylight hours are long, even in October, and you can easily drive well into the evening and think it's still 4pm... we still carry a bit of that Aussie night-driving fear from our many 'roo-dodging' experiences years back.

Allez Les Bleus!

An ecstatic win

Te Anau is a tiny but very touristy town in NZ's Fjordland region, built on the incredibly pretty (are we even surprised anymore?) Lake Te Anau. It's the main jumping-off spot for visiting Milford and Doubtful Sounds, two fjords many visitors explore by boat, but still a good 2.5 hour drive from Milford Sound-- an area of very remote and inaccessible wilderness. But before our trek out to the fjords, we spent the evening in The Moose, where in fact, where the entire town and all of its tourists had congregated inside to watch the Rugby World Cup quarter-finals. The game was especially important to our travelling party, as France was facing off against England in what was sure to be an exciting game. With the help of Jenny & Stephane's red, blue and white wigs and paraphernalia, we got in touch with our long-lost French roots and cheered on "Les Bleus", surprisingly, with quite an unproportionate number of passionate French supporters for the size of Te Anau. We subsequently learned the French national anthem and a few sports cheers, and when they beat England, the entire bar went crazy. It was so much fun to watch (and not really all that hard to understand) and it must have been around the time that we got really, really hooked on rugby...

But onto more adventures! That next morning we hopped in the car and set off on Milford Road, where we wound between mountains, for the first hour, higher and higher until we reached patches of snow (which we couldn't resist a frolic in), and entered into the Homer Tunnel-- a 1.2km tunnel that veers seemingly endlessly through a mountain, on a downward slope, which was a strange feeling. The tunnel is an incredible feat of engineering and construction, started as a job-creation scheme during the Great Depression, it took nearly 20 years to dig, and only recently was widened to accommodate two lanes of vehicles.

Mirror Lake

On the other side of the Homer Tunnel, the mountains appeared to go on forever to the still-hidden fjords. The highway continued to wind downwards, with plenty of great stops to check out, like Mirror Lake, until we reached Milford Sound. That's where we had our first encounter with the irritating New Zealand sandfly: here we were, innocently emerging from the car when suddenly we were ambushed! It appeared others were having the same problems, so we took a few hurried photos with the amazing (but hard to concretrate on) backdrop of Milford Sound, and dashed to the boats, where thankfully someone had thought to build a large structure made of glass, where we could enjoy the views without swatting. Luckily, thanks to the chilly temperatures we wore many layers of clothing, which the sandflies couldn't bite through, but Dayle still managed to find one persistently sucking blood out from between two of her fingers-- a bite which didn't disappear or cease itching for more than two weeks following the visit.

Glorious Milford Sound

But we suppose, if the sandfly terror was our admission fee to get down into the gorgeous natural scenery in Fjordland, well, it was worth it. We set off on our 2-hour boat cruise from the end of Milford Sound to the ocean (15 km), watching the weather change numerous times from sunny to cloudy to rainy to sunny. Seals swam alongside out boat as we shrieked with delight. The captain steered the boat underneath waterfalls plummetting down the cliffs on either side of the fjord and right up to impressive rock formations, and shared impressive facts about the area. Probably one of the highlights was Seal Rock, one of the only parts of the fjord (it was massive cliffs everywhere) accessible to seals climbing out of the water to rest, and we learned the incredible cuteness power of a mass of sleeping seals on a rock. It was a pretty great afternoon.

Waterfall fun

Following our sandfly dash back to the car (a pity we couldn't stroll more slowly through the lush fern-filled coastal rainforest), we made a dash back to Te Anau, and then onwards to Queenstown, to be done with the driving already. After a little bit of hunting, we found a sweet, sweet place to rest our feet for the next few days with fabulous views of Lake Wakatipu in the centre of town. We didn't think about the fact that the near-vertical walk down Turner Street to the heart of Queenstown also meant a horrific trudge up at the end of the night, but it was rugby time again (this time New Zealand vs. Argentina) and so finding a big screen was mandatory. It was another good game--and unexpectedly AMAZING food at the Ballarat Trading Company-- and we took it as a good omen for our trip to continue in the best of fates.

We spent the next few days doing silly tourist things in Queenstown: eating impossibly massive burgers at the legendary Fergburger, wandering around Lake Wakatipu, taking the Skyline gondola for views high above Queenstown (and having a blast riding the luge around the tracks on the peak), and playing a ridiculous but adorable mini-golf course made up of a miniature robotic town, sampling a good variety of local wines, and relaxing in our awesome two-storey townhouse (much nicer than any of the apartments any of us have lived in). It was good times for our last few days, before Stephane and Jenny left us to take in more live rugby on the North Island....

Mmmm, Fergburger for breakfast.

The Luge

Jenny putts for the win

NZ Continued: Driving the Coast & More Penguins

2011-11-03T21:15:00.016+11:00

A continuation of our travels through NZ...

[6 October, 2011]
After a super exciting penguin-filled evening in Oamaru, we decided to spend a bit of time exploring the charming little town by day. It was an easy walk to the harbour from our hostel, past plenty of well-preserved Victorian buildings and gardens. The historic arhcitecture must have inspired the town's residents, as next to the traditional was bits of Steampunk everywhere (if you're into Steampunk, Oamaru's the place for you!). We were especially entertained by the coin-operated locomotive that spit out flames and made train noises as it chugged along on the spot in front of "Steampunk HQ". In fact, it totally scared the crap out of us when we dropped a coin in the night before and it came alive! (Much less scary by day).

We did a bit of wandering, visiting the (vacant by day) penguin bird houses by the harbour and a street with craftspeople (a homemade whisky maker!). The guys went back to get our car and Jenny and Dayle continued their stroll along the waterfront towards the penguin colony (we were on a mission to get some cute little stuffed penguins to accompany us on our trip). We were halfway there when an older man called over to us from behind the chainlink fence of what looked like a boatyard: "Hey! Do you girls want to see the penguins?"

Errr. Jenny and I looked at each other, half wondering if it was some elaborate pick-up line, or worse. It was however, broad daylight in the middle of a tiny town, and curiosity got the best of us, so we went over to find out more (and quickly felt sheepish for being so suspicious!). Don was a nice older guy with a soft spot for the penguins, and told us that he thought it was a bit ridiculous that they charge visitors so much money to watch the penguins at the colony, when they're actually living in everyone's backyards in town! Don led us around the boatyard, where there were little boxes built everywhere to help the little blue penguins with their nesting. He lifted up the lids on the boxes so we could "get a photo" amd sure enough, inside each was one or two, slightly stunned but very blue, tiny penguins nestled inside! The little nocturnal birds didn't look too happy to be disturbed, but Don reassured us they don't mind, and they're actually not afraid of people at all. In fact, when big trucks arrive at the boatyard early in the morning to deliver oil and gas (ahem, petrol), the penguins will get up out of their nests, jump around and flap their little flipper-wings, "scolding" those damn truck drivers for waking them up! Don was a fantastic tour guide and we learned that some of the penguins have been returning to the same nests for 14 years (though now it's the younger generation owning the nest), and that once there's chicks hatched in the nest, only one of the adults will head out to sea for food and the other will babysit. I gather we were there just as they were starting their nesting for the year - great timing! It was incredibly cool to learn about the amazing little birds from the locals' perspective. And all it cost us was a little bit of razzing from the staff in the office, when Don brought us in and introduced us as "two girls from France who think the French are going to win the World Cup!" Well worth it, in my opinion. :)

Later on that day we hopped in the car and drove along the east coast to Dunedin, one of New Zealand's bigger cities, taking in the interesting Moeraki Boulders along the way-- a bunch of perfectly round rocks sitting at the seashore of Moeraki Beach. According to Maori legend, the boulders were left behind by an ancient giant canoe of the Gods which crashed on the shore after they journeyed across the Great Ocean of Kiwa (the Pacific Ocean) to what is now New Zealand-- the boulders being the canoe's cargo, the gourds holding water for the journey (or read the better explained version). Or if, you're looking at the big rocks purely on face value, they're old and quite interesting as some of them have been split open like giant solid chocolate eggs (OK, so we may have have the Cadbury factory ahead in Dunedin, a little bit on our minds!) on a very pretty beach.

We didn't get to Dunedin until late in the afternoon, and we couldn't get there fast enough to devour the cheese bounty we'd picked up along the way at the delightful Evansdale Cheese Factory, where we sampled about 10 varieties of cheese and a heated cheese debate took place on which cheese was yummiest-- the French voting for the stinkiest one possible, the Canadians voting for the gooeiest mild brie. Well, in the end, we bought three huge chunks of the stinky blue, the brie, and an awesome smoked brie, and had a feast in our (empty, of course) hostel room under the shadow of our bunk beds at the Stafford YHA. We all agreed that although none of us enjoyed sleeping in hostels, we could deal with it if we were putting our savings towards delicious cheese.

That evening we explored a bit of Dunedin, known for its ornate old buildings. They were indeed beautiful but perhaps we'd had our fill of Victorian architecture in Oamaru. We had originally planned to go to the Cadbury Factory for a chocolate tour (sadly it was already closed!) and also to head out on a nature tour of the Otago Peninsula to see the rare and elusive penguins (!) but with that checked off our lists, and not feeling enthused enough about the albatrosses we could also see on the peninsula, we opted for another kind of sightseeing.... Dunedin's pubs! And indeed, sitting in a quaint pub by a fire, sampling the local refreshments was the best type of sightseeing one could do on a cold, early-spring Friday night in southern NZ.

[More to come... in the meantime, check out some of our photos and videos posted now on our Flickr page!]

We're Baaaack

2011-10-25T20:49:00.000+11:00

We're back in sweltering Brisbane after a delightful week and a bit in New Zealand. For one thing, it sure is strange to holiday in a cold country only to come back to a hot place... the complete opposite of what we'd usually do! But though the South Island was a little chilly, it was kind of nice to put on some layers, don toques and gloves, and - dare I say it?- stomp around in the snow! Well, the snow thrill wore off in about 20 seconds or so, but it sure did make for lovely photos.

Anyway! We had a fantastic time -- NZ far surpassed our expectations for being a great place to travel. We lucked out with pretty amazing weather (lots of sunshine and blue skies), had great travel companions, and a strong Aussie dollar on our side. The Kiwis we met were really nice, endearingly rugby-mad, but sadly few and far between. The South Island felt more than anything... kind of empty. On almost any road in the parts we travelled to, you could count the cars you passed on your fingers, and when we did meet people running hostels or shops or tour companies, more than half the time they were from another country. It was a little weird... it seems that most New Zealanders must either live on the North Island, or in Australia. Where we went, it also even felt devoid of wildlife, which could have been due to climate, time of day, introduced species wiping out the native fauna, or maybe something else (we kept seeing signs about poison being used in national parks to wipe out various pest species...).

So it was just us and the sheep for most of the trip. We drove our Toyota Camry up and down mountains, hiked a few great trails around Mount Cook, Lake Tasman, Mt Aspiring National Park, and up Franz Josef Glacier - an unbelievable day for more than a few reasons! We got into a few adventures, trying our luck at paragliding in Queenstown, and scoring a free helicopter ride off the glacier when the mountain next to us started collapsing into the valley below. We had some great local food - cheeses, wine, lamb, and ketchup out of a can (for dipping grilled cheese sandwiches, silly!). We got caught up in the Rugby World Cup frenzy, we saw some rare penguins, and took a boat cruise through the fjords of Milford Sound, our boat chaperoned by adorable seals who swam alongside us. And besides all of that, it was so nice to get out into the fresh air and reunite with old friends. We're definitely already dreaming of a return someday to check out the North Island, and perhaps to embark on one of NZ's many Great Walks, where we can get gloriously lost in a national park for a few days at a time!

But that's our trip in a nutshell.... more detail to come! And if you've got the urge to look at a million or so mountain photos, don't forget to check our Flickr page. xx A&D

On A Penguin and Mountain High

2011-10-06T23:52:00.001+11:00

Hello from gorgeous and cold New Zealand! It's been a crazy couple of days already, but since we scored some free wifi, we thought we'd take advantage and write a little update.

We arrived in Christchurch to freezing cold weather and just an hour after an aftershock (damn!) on the 4th. Met up with our friends Stephane and Jenny and we're picking up where we left off in 2008 when we parted ways in Melbourne- they're perfect travel companions. Got our car and cruised around Christchurch as Disaster Papparazzi (hey, I call it photojournalism!) -- seeing all sorts of cracked, condemned, and empty houses, shops, and streets. The city centre is fenced off, crumbled, and deserted, and there are workmen about but that's all -- Adrian said it well when he remarked it felt like something out of a zombie movie!

From there, we drove inland on a dreary and cold afternoon after a big breakfast at Denny's (yes, the American chain!!) towards Mount Cook, watching the mountains in front of us get taller and taller, and oohing and aahing and stopping the car every time we saw a snow-capped peak peeking out from the clouds. And nearly every landscape belonged to us-- there's a certain feeling around the South Island that I've experienced only in the Aussie Outback: a huge sky, a massive landscape, and a peaceful and profound emptiness-- solitude, I guess. Very hard to describe! (Has anyone else felt this sort of thing? Help!)

It cleared up just as we hit Lake Tekapo, a beautiful blue glacial lake. We kept on until we hit Mount Cook Village in the evening, a contrived little ski chalet-feeling settlement built in a flat valley beneath towering mountains with a posh hotel, 2 hostels, and a couple of houses for the Department of Conservation - Mt Cook is NZ's highest mountain at 3700m or so, though not that tall by Canadian or European standards- but still pretty amazing. We stayed and ate in this lovely "Backpacker Lodge" with a pub decorated with deer head hunting trophies and great beer called Tui on tap -- unfortunately the "grocery stores" were basically a few items of junk food and instant noodles behind the hostel reception desk. Ugh. So much for saving money by cooking! Every room had a view of the mountains that was almost too perfect-- it felt constantly like we were looking at a painting, not a real scene!

This morning we set off for a hike to Mt Cook lookout, a really cool trail running along the valley floor through grass and lots of spiky plants. We got close to the mountains and another turquoise lake at the lookout and heard a BOOM and a rumbling sounding something like a big truck going over a bridge on a highway... this happened a few more times, minutes apart, before we saw what it was: avalanches high up in the snowy mountains! Just crazy. We hiked another trail later on to Tasman Lake, in the same area, and this time found a huge blue lake with giant ice chunks floating in it-- that didn't look that big until we saw a teeny little yellow tour boat cruising between the icebergs.... and we realized how warped our sense of perspective is.

After our mountain hikes we headed back to the coast in our car, passing rolling hills, perfectly still lakes, and many, many sheep (with which we play our very favourite country-driving game... honking at sheep and making them hop and run this way ad that.... a forgotten pleasure from our drives around Tasmania, but somehow a game Stephane and Jenny also know! Maybe it's universal?) We made it to the coastal town of Oamaru about two hours before dusk, and checked out the Blue Penguin Centre to find out about seeing the little blue penguins the town, and this part of the coast, is known for. Turns out they've turned the place into sort of a Phillip Island (Australia) style circus-- $25 to sit in the grandstand and watch the penguins swim into shore from the ocean. 147 penguins counted last night, they kept telling us! We sort of wondered if we could just spot some on our own, and then one of the ladies at the centre let it slip in hushed tones that: "If you drive to this spot on the map right now, it'll take you only about 5 minutes to get there, and if you look hard and peer into the bushes alongside this beach, you might see a yellow-eyed penguin, as they come in from the ocean around this time to their nests in the bushes, where they live and hide along this inlet". Why not? We thought.... we could always come back to the penguin circus later.

We get to the viewing area and it seemed the word was out -- there were 5 or so other cars parked there, and it actually wasn't long at all before we saw funny little shapes in the bushes on the steep incline from the beach. Penguins! More emerged from the grasses and we were totally photo happy... and even video happy, as we watched them build nests, shake their cute flipper arms, and make the weirdest bird noises ever (we'll edit the clips together and post them on the blog in the future). It was insane! They totally stole the spotlight from the adorable little seal flopping around on the beach far below, but ah well, these were really cute penguins!

Finally the sun set and we were so full of penguin-spotting joy that we just headed to a hostel and a grocery store.... and then what do we learn from the lovely hostel manager? Well, if we just walk to the town pier, there should be plenty of the little blue penguins nesting along the rocks at night. Sure enough.... well, none of us have ever seen so many penguins in one day, but there is something about spotting rare (?) wildlife in their natural habitats that just gives you this amazing feeling of satisfaction. Euphoria, really! And so far New Zealand has been a continuous shot of pure euphoria. We can't wait to find out what comes next!

Bye for now!

2011-10-03T23:44:00.000+11:00

Wool socks: check. Polar fleece jackets: check. Raincoats: check. Cameras and blank memory cards: check and check!

One more sleep and we're off to New Zealand for the next 13 days. We're super excited for all the tramping and the country road cruising. We're totally stoked to climb a glacier. Not to mention ooh and ahh at adorable penguins and mountain vistas. Maybe we'll even get to hug a sheep. We can only hope!

We're back in Australia on the 16th of October, so see you then!
Bye for now! xo A&D

A Crash Course

2011-10-02T22:24:00.000+11:00

Wow... that's all I can say after finally finishing reading my copy of Canon EOS 7D For Dummies. For anyone who has trouble getting through that fat camera manual -- or should I say, tome -- that Canon sticks into the box of every new camera, this is what you need to do: get out to your closest bookshop ASAP and get the Dummies book for your model of camera. My father really had it figured out when he got me the book for Christmas this year (and subsequently got himself a new camera and the corresponding Dummies book).

You probably know how much I'm in love with my Canon DSLR (I'm sure I've rambled on and on about it numerous times), and as I take it out at least once a week for some shooting, I like to think I've gotten to know the thing pretty well. Well, the Dummies book proved me totally wrong (but in a very good way). In celebration of my camera's first birthday, but mostly thanks to our impending trip this week to photogenic New Zealand, I've learned that I can adjust the intensity of the flash, create my own custom menus of my favourite functions, extend my ISO to 12800 (seriously!) and set the autofocus track a bird as it flies around in my viewfinder. There are so many functions I really had no idea were in my camera... now I just have to make sure I remember them for the right photographic moment.

When I first got my 7D, the day before we headed off to Philly last August, I tried to read the Canon manual on the 12-hour bus ride, but in the end I got through enough to figure out how to turn off the flash (ugh, flash!) and pretty much used the "Creative Auto" setting through the whole trip -- not a terrible thing, as the camera still took stunning photos, but I knew I was missing something. I guess really the best thing about reading about my camera from a "dummies" perspective is that the author really just puts everything in context, so I actually understood what having different light metering modes means for me rather than just memorizing where in the menus I could change them. What a great thing this book has been!

And while we're on the topic of photography books, I also should recommend Scott Kelby's The Digital Photography Book Volumes 1, 2, and 3 for the great tips and tricks in there. I devoured those last year after they were recommended by another photo-nerd friend shortly after I got my camera (but only vaguely knew how to use it). It's more about techniques on how to get pro photos, and Scott's awesome for making it sound easy, and he's fun to read! So check those ones out too.

Now that my head's packed full of camera know-how, it's time to take it to "The Land of the Long White Cloud" -- we're off in two days and we're sooooo excited! Photos to come definitely. -D.

Leaping Lizards!

2011-09-20T23:09:00.031+10:00

Something happened last week in Brisbane where the temperatures suddenly shot way up from the usual 22-degree days to around 28C to 30C. Suddenly we're walking on the shadowy side of the street and everyone's in sundresses again. It's still supposed to be spring for another few months, and there are lots of flowers blooming in true spring spirit. But the best part about this early summertime is it's brought out the lizard population in the city!

Not far from our apartment is the South Bank Parklands, a great strip of grass, trees, walkways, and cafes (and the artificial beach) running alongside the river for many city blocks. Griffith University stands at one end of the parkland and just beyond the campus is a delightful little patch of jungly duckpond, where birds cruise around and kids play in the playground (and teenagers make out). We're well used to all of that scenery, so imagine our surprise when one day, we saw a big fat iguana-like lizard perched on a rock at the edge of the duckpond. And then a bit of movement catches your eye on another rock, and there's a smaller lizard, running on its hind legs in a near-standing position, just like a tiny velociraptor!

It's a lizard-vs-duck world out there.

The paths throughout the parklands are always packed with joggers and cyclists, and now add to that fearless lizards dashing across the pathways, just to make things a little more interesting. They don't appear very afraid of people, and they certainly aren't afraid of birds that are way bigger than them -- I witnessed a magpie vs. lizard standoff one day and the large and nasty magpie (the ones we're afraid of) was the first one to flee.

An unlikely jogging hazard

"Yeah.... what?!"

The former Gondwanaland park

We're not sure if the lizards were just hibernating during the last few months, or if they were holidaying in the Outback or something. But apparently the jungly duckpond area of the parklands was formerly something like a living educational theme park about Gondwanaland, the big prehistoric land mass that all the continents broke off from many eons ago. After the theme park was shut down, the "dinosaurs" of the miniature Gondwanaland (aka. Gondwana Rainforest Sanctuary) were either set free of perhaps escaped -- at least, that's one theory on why there are so many reptiles hanging around the river. But we also saw quite a few lizards sunning themselves on the rocks next to the cliffs of Kangaroo Point (a suburb near South Bank that rises high above the city atop some gorgeous riverside cliffs). It's lizard heaven here in Brisbane: rocks, sunshine, plenty of bugs...what else could a lizard want?

Lizard near the Kangaroo Point cliffs

We even have a resident lizard who's made his home on our own back patio -- a little skittish skink that lives in the raised root of our palm tree, and comes out for sunshine briefly until he's spotted by curious breakfasters peeping into his home. We named him Louie... and promise to snap a photo of him if we're ever quick enough one day.

Garden skink - a spitting image of our backyard pal Louie!
(image by ozwildlife)

City of Lights

2011-09-14T23:28:00.001+10:00

Lately Brisbane's been aflurry with lights, lasers, and fireworks over the river, all part of the three-week long annual Brisbane Festival. There's been a nightly show called the Santos City of Lights, with lasers shooting from the tops of buildings, lights projected onto streams of water pumped into the air from the river, and and music to go with it. We stopped by on more than one occasion to check it out. It was pretty mesmerizing! And so photogenic.

We joined the big crowd at the river's edge for a spectacular show.

Barges anchored in the river shot jets of water to project light onto.

Some sort of floating, moving light shape. In the background in the left is the Treasury Casino,
a beautiful old building in the CBD.

The finale of the show featured a jellyfish-like creature "swimming" above the river. So cool!

From another angle, on another night.

Destination New Zealand!

2011-09-02T16:33:00.010+10:00

Wow, it's September! It's kind of crazy that we've already been back in Australia for six months now - and sadly, have not yet even left Queensland. So we're truthfully a bit giddy for October to roll around - because in just four weeks' time, we'll be headed off to explore some totally new territory: the south island of New Zealand!

We're taking the easy way out with this trip, actually. It was actually pretty much all already planned when our friends Stephane and Jenny (who are living over in NZ and about to wrap up their year there) invited us along on their weeklong trip in October, where they'll drive from Christchurch to Queenstown in a leisurely, on-a-budget-but-with-lots-of-hiking-and-photo-snapping sort of manner... just the way we like it! It's a real double whammy - not only will we get to reunite with some great friends (with whom we spent a lot of time with during our first stint in Oz - in Echuca, Port Douglas, and Melbourne), but we'll also get to finally visit a country we've been meaning to for ages.

Kiwi dollar... how cute.

On October 4, we'll fly into Christchurch airport and meet up with Stephane and Jenny. We probably won't see much - if any - of Christchurch, which we hear is still in quite a bit of rubble after the earthquake early this year. From there we'll wind our way south/west to the mountain/adventure town of Queenstown, via Mt Cook, Dunedin, Fjordland National Park (at the southernmost tip of New Zealand, and possibly the world!) and a few other stops. We've got about a week and a half to soak up the scenery and the Kiwi hospitality, both of which we've heard great things about. We're also stoked that the Aussie dollar is doing so well against the New Zealand dollar, making it a cheaper trip than we thought, and also for the chance to brush up on our conversational French with Stephane and Jenny.

Queenstown: looks awesome!

We're slightly worried it's going to be freezing cold in October, which is still springtime, and the fact that we'll be hanging out in high altitudes pretty close to Antarctica doesn't help. (Note to self: add wool socks to the packing list!) So unfortunately, it's not a camping trip, but we're hoping we'll be so distracted by the stunning scenery that we'll forget how cold it is. And maybe we'll see a hobbit or two - it is, after all, the gorgeous setting where Lord of the Rings was filmed. It should be a good adventure anyway. The countdown's begun!

Catan-mania!

2011-08-25T16:18:00.023+10:00

Shhh... don't tell anyone, but we're kind of hooked on a slightly nerdy board game.

We blame our pal Tim, who gave Settlers of Catan as a gift to his wife Fleur's family for Christmas. They all started playing and couldn't stop. Then Adrian arrived in Oz and stayed at their house for a week in February, and played Catan all week. Instant convert.

Dayle was a little more skeptical - only slightly - but in less than the time it takes to play a game (like an hour or two), she was a Catan junkie as well. Soon there were many Settlers of Catan afternoons and evenings happening between the four of us, meanwhile we probably should have been out enjoying the beach, or strolling through the eucalyptus forests. (But whatever! We didn't come back to Oz for beach or exotic trees... right?) And then our friends (and now housemates) Megan and Justin came to visit, and we spread the Catan love to them too (and have since hooked their friends). It's like a disease or something!

Rufus the cat and Fleur face off

So, in case you're looking for a new pastime, and going to the movies/watching sports/going bowling just isn't doing it for you anymore, we'd have to say it's time to check out Settlers of Catan. It's nerdy enough that we had to buy ours in Mind Games, that store that's filled with Magic Cards and stuff. But it's also really fun! It's something like Risk, in that you need to expand your empire turn by turn, but it's a little like Monopoly where you build houses and hotels (well, settlements and cities, but close enough) once you collect enough "resources". There's a lot of strategy and a lot of trading and shifty deals happening. And did we mention it can get pretty nasty?

Anyway, it seems there are others out there like us - Tim has discovered there's a somewhat-secret Catan club at his workplace! And when Adrian discovered and downloaded the iPhone game for Catan, it was the best $5 he'd ever spent. No more boredom on 2-hour train rides, laundromat waits, or evenings when there's nothing on TV. We think you should check it out, if you haven't already....

Rufus contemplates his next move

Checking out Brisbane

2011-08-16T16:21:00.001+10:00

View to Brisbane city from South Bank

Hello, Brisbane! Yes, we've made the move up north to Brissie, Brisvegas, Brisneyland, whatever you want to call it (we're still wondering exactly why Brisbane has so many damn nicknames!) and we're settling into life in the city.

It's a pretty nice place, with lots of nice people. It definitely doesn't have that work-work-work attitude of Sydney (so we hear), and it's got a great climate -- hence why we keep meeting ex-Melburnians who moved up here after deciding it was a little cold for them down south.

Yarrrrr, possums!

Sadly, it doesn't have the gorgeousness and grandeur of Sydney and its harbour, and it's minus the cafe culture, the fascinating little alleyways and the old buildings of Melbourne too, but as we explore the city bit by bit, we're finding we like it more all the time. There's heaps of beautiful plants everywhere, for one, thanks to the subtropical climate, and we are both madly in love with the typical Queenslander home: generally a big wooden house on stilts (designed to let the air flow underneath cool the inside) with a huge verandah, and often, really cool stained-glass windows for accent, and feels a bit like it would fit in in the Deep South of the U.S. There's also something of a wild feeling to the city -- nearly every wander our residential neighbourhood has found brush turkeys running around. And they're crazy! (And having poultry running loose in the city will forever make us think of Asia.) And the possums.... which are really cute, but I have a wee bit of hatred for after one devoured my basil plant leaf by leaf on our back patio one evening.

We heart Queenslanders!

But it is nice waking up to the sounds of bird calls (reminds us of our camping days!) while living a ten-minute walk from the Brisbane River, which cuts through the centre of the city. And we do love that there are parks everywhere -- how very... English? So perhaps we just haven't been here long enough, but we're finding it very hard to put our fingers on exactly what Brisbane is all about. It's certainly a weird mix of places we've been, and it's unique in that way for sure. Nothing stands out as overly spectacular, but at the same time, it's all very lovely. While we're still stumped as to what to put on a tourist's must-see list of the city, we do like that we're always stumbling upon pretty buildings and scenic vistas, and for that reason, we'll just keep our eyes open and keep on observing our new home.

Surfers Paradise Hit List #4: Our 2 Favourite Pastimes

2011-07-26T15:00:00.105+10:00

From now on, if anyone ever asks us what our interests are, our answer is going to be "Surfing.... and brunch."

Surfing time

So on our last weekend in Surfers, like many weekends before, we did just that. Actually, we hadn't done much surfing in the past few months, thanks to winter rolling around and it getting a whole lot colder, and thanks to not owning surfboards or wetsuits. Luckily, we'd just learned of some cheap early-Saturday-morning surf lessons ($15!) for locals that were happening at the surf school just down the block from us.

We almost chickened out when we saw the weather forecast for the day -- 41 km/hour winds! Eek! -- and saw the giant waves crashing on the beach. But then again, what better time to learn? So we showed up at Cheyne Horan Surf School at 7:45am that Saturday morning and just tried our best not to look at the waves on the way there.

When we arrived, it appeared it would be just us and four giggly high school girls, who were all competing for the attention of Mark, our surf instructor. He seemed slightly relieved not to be alone with them, and gave us a few really good pointers once we got down to the beach. This time, we were practicing on spongey foam boards, so there was less of a chance of getting smashed up by our surfboards (yay!) despite the wind and the waves. And the big water was actually a good thing -- with more waves to catch, there wasn't much waiting, and plenty of room to practice. And though our lesson was only a little more than an hour long, we were totally exhausted by the end! And starving... surfing kinda works up an appetite.

Heaven.

So then it was onto the next order of business: having our very favourite breakfast in town once again -- the very awesome $10 all-you-can-eat feast at the Surfers Paradise RSL (the local veteran's club, which once inside looks less like a Canadian legion hall and more like a combination of casino, pub, and Holiday Inn restaurant, complete with patrons in Hawaiian shirts, informal dining and gaudy carpet). But ever since hearing about it, we've been hooked. And we're surprised the place isn't packed every day, because it's delicious! Your ten bucks gets you not only a cooked breakfast of eggs & meat, or various omelettes, or a beautiful French toast topped with sauteed mushrooms, herbs, and sundried tomatoes.... plus unlimited brewed coffee (Adrian's favourite), orange juice, croissants, pastries and fruit (and toast and cereal, if you're still hungry)

The only problem we can see is that it's all over by 10:30am... but we do usually manage to get a good half hour of eating in before it shuts down. It's got to be the best-kept secret in Surfers! We're thinking maybe they're keeping it hush-hush from all the students, or else there would be no room for the elderley folk and tradies (aka construction workers) who are always in there. But if you ever find yourself in Surfers, it's the best deal in town! Wow, we're getting super hungry just remembering our last meal there.

Surfers Paradise Hit List #3: Our Favourite Watering Hole

2011-07-24T18:29:00.096+10:00

The Q1 (left) and The Peninsula (2nd from right)

If there's one thing Surfers Paradise is known for, it's the nightlife. Pub crawl tours, nightclubs, pubs, gentleman's establishments... Surfers is choc full of them. Now, most of what we've encountered isn't really our style (maybe it would have been when we were 19?), so naturally, we were surprised to find our favourite nightlife spot right under our noses. It's not much of a walk from home, but it's a bit of an elevator journey -- 77 storeys up atop the world's third tallest residential building.

Embarassingly enough, we actually lived across the street from the Q1 (at the fairly tall Peninsula building) for about four months before finally getting fancied up and venturing to the Skypoint lounge at the top for a cocktail (thanks to couple of free passes in order to avoid the hefty cover charge). And boy, were we ever glad we didn't miss out on this one!

Espresso martini and mojito, yum

The Q1 has one of those super-fast elevators, with a somewhat creepy video ceiling that shows you exactly what barrelling up the elevator shaft looks like, as your ears pop and you wait for the recorded voice to tell you you've reached floor 77. And then you step out and it's all windows... floor-to-ceiling windows looking over the glittery lights up and down the Gold Coast. Ahhhh.

We've been to Skypoint twice now, and both times we couldn't help but doing the 360-degree wander around the building to admire the coast at night. Even our building, the Peninsula, at 50-odd floors, looked really small.

And then there's the drink list! It's not the most expansive menu, but there's more than a few yummy drinks on it: the bar's signature cocktail, the Mile-High martini was my favourite, with Alize Gold, passionfruit juice and mandarin vodka. Besides that, there's all the standard cocktails and plenty more delicious martinis (espresso!) and a very awesome mojito.

It seems not too many people know about Skypoint yet (or perhaps it's the cover charge keeping the riff-raff out), but there was always lots of lounge seating to swill our cocktails and enjoy the skyline from. There's something so fun about pretending to be fat cats and sipping martinis way up high in the sky. And then walking home... across the road.

The Mile High and a classic martini

The Peninsula & the Q1, best of friends.

Surfers Paradise Hit List #2: Our Favourite Form of Exercise

2011-07-19T10:58:00.019+10:00

It's hard to call a 45-minute walk on one of the most gorgeous beaches ever exercise, but doesn't that just make it even more rewarding?

Giant jellyfish!

From the day we first set foot in Surfers, we've been trying to make sure we never take the beach for granted. At any time of day, there's many more people like us doing the exact same thing; in fact, one of the local papers even publishes the exact best times to walk on the beach (according to when the tides expose that lovely flat, packed, walkable sand) with the daily weather report. So one of the things we have been doing the most since deciding to move to Brisbane is taking long strolls along the beach.

Living by the beach and seeing it every day, you realize how the landscape is constantly changing: after a windy couple of days, the dunes are bigger, smaller, or even in other places. After a bout of big waves, sometimes the sand has been carved into small cliffs, even along the water. And the sandbars in the water build themselves up, flatten themselves down, and move along as well. It's always cool to see what the waves have washed up, too: some days it's seashells, some days purplish jellyfish, and one day we came across a jellyfish the size of a truck tire. It was pretty crazy.

Bird lesson in Kurrawa Park

One sunny morning, we thought we'd walk down to Broadbeach, the next suburb south, and grab a coffee for the walk back. It's about a 45-minute stroll and was lovely. On our way into the cafe strip, I was taking photos of some of the flowers around the seaside park in Broadbeach when we met Brian, a retired guy with a soft spot for birds. He was an interesting fellow, and on his daily walk to the library, he always carries a bag of mince (ground meat) in his pocket -- and his friends the Butcherbirds know it. We learned a lot about the Butcherbird from Brian as they landed on his shoulders and arms, and swooped in as soon as they spotted a little meat in his fingers. Adrian even fed a few of them too. They're pretty cute but great hunters-- in fact, they eat insects, lizards, and even other birds. He also told us about all the other species of birds --and snakes! -- that live along the coastline, even amongst the urban sprawl. It was a bit of a lesson in appreciating the smaller, simpler things in our environment, and it's good to know there are people out there that don't let all the amazing things in our neighbourhoods go unnoticed.

Brian tells us all about the amazingly intelligent Butcherbirds

Inquisitive little devil!

Surfers Paradise Hit List #1: Our Favourite Cafe

2011-07-15T17:15:00.028+10:00

We've been itching to tell everyone all about our very favourite coffee joint in Surfers ever since we first visited it in May -- it's a real gem of a place and totally unlike anything else in Surfers Paradise. Hidden away on the second floor of an open-air arcade (a type of mall), by a language school, a Japanese restaurant (Yamasakura, which by the way, is also awesome!), a few real estate agencies, and an internet cafe, is a great little spot called Black Coffee Lyrics.

It's fairly new and just off the main strip, and we might not have ever just stumbled across it on our own, had someone in a local shop not told us about it. It's just the sort of cafe we would dream of creating ourselves: with exposed brick walls and full of antique couches, vintage wallpaper, rustic wooden shelves, mismatched old chairs, and old books and board games galore! Not to mention, they play all of our favourite bands on the stereo and make a killer chai latte. It's all about the details: even the outside is done up with wooden shuttered windows, and each hot drink comes with one of those adorable tourist-souvenir spoons from a far-off place to stir your sugar in with. So from our very first latte date on the couches next to an antique birdcage (with some sort of mangy fake bird inside), we were in love.

Sure, Black Coffee Lyrics is more than a tad hipster, and it's definitely the kind of place you'd find on Ossington in Toronto, or tucked away in a tiny laneway in Melbourne. It is even run by a team of 20-something hipster dudes in skinny jeans, who must know we're real suckers for old furniture and good coffee and tunes. We can't help but love the place -- and just want to bring everyone we know there too!

We've been happy to see it get busier and busier as the weeks go by -- in fact, on one cold night we stopped in for a coffee, it so was packed full of hipsters in giant glasses and scarves swilling whisky we couldn't get a seat. We're just happy that such a cool place is enjoying so much popularity in a town where overpriced, ordinary seafood restaurants and cafe chains are the norm. Love!

Even the outside is cute.

Fancy some Scrabble?

It's Official.

2011-07-10T16:55:00.008+10:00


Brizvegas, here we come!

Yes, it's now official: we are moving away from the beaches of Gold Coast for the greener pastures (?!) of Brisbane.

It was a hard choice, and a busy couple of weeks apartment hunting, but all signs are pointing to a move to the city (which, by the way, is less than 1 hour by car and 2 hours by public transit to Gold Coast). Adrian's soon to be starting an internship with superstar software company Red Hat, in Brisbane, and has got a few of his classes at the South Bank campus in the city, Dayle will soon be finishing up her job in Surfers, and we've got some cool new flatmates -- our old pals Megan & Justin from Melbourne -- who have made it back to Brisbane just in time for us to get a place together! Not to mention, we've been craving a little bit of that city buzz -- the cafes, the non-overpriced, non-tourist restaurants, the museums and art galleries, the markets, and all that good cultural stuff we've been feeling a lack of since moving into Surfers.

So while we'll miss being next to the beach, we'll definitely make it back there from time to time. We're looking forward to hanging out in the city's many parks, and strolling along the river, too. We're also making an effort to do all of our favourite Gold Coast things before our move... which we'll be sure to tell you all about. And if you ever feel like sending us a postcard (or Tim Horton's coffee!) just email us at thebigquestionmark[at]gmail.com and we'll be sure to send you our new address, pronto! Talk to you soon, xx D&A

Canada Day in Surfers Paradise

2011-07-02T12:21:00.007+10:00

The national uniform?

Plaid, plaid, and more plaid. That's what we saw when we went to the Griffith University Canadian Students Association's (yes, there are a lot of Canadian students here) Canada Day celebration at Melba's in Surfers. There were quite a few hockey jerseys, and lots of those ear-flap hats, too. We spent the night trying to figure out if the crowd was a lot of Canadians simply stereotyping Canadians, or if it's just true that we all do wear a ton of plaid?

As the party had started at 3pm (yikes!) and we arrived around 9pm, the advertised Alexander Keith's, caesars, and poutine were long gone. We did have an amusing conversation with a Vancouverite who explained how, in desperation for a caesar (as there's no Clamato juice to be found in Oz), she and her flatmates have done everything from import Clamato at a staggering fee from the American Food Store in Melbourne, to buying lots of canned clams and draining the juice out of them. We can at least say Canucks are very determined, if nothing else.

Plaid, and more plaid.


We must have forgotten out own ear-flap hats back in Ontario.


We ran into Felix, from Germany, in camouflage as a Canuck.

Heaps of red.


We left before it all got too messy.

In Love With: Beach Concerts

2011-06-19T13:37:00.014+10:00

Dayle has just started a job helping out run the Surfers Paradise Festival, a huge three-week-long arts & culture fest that's run by a city-council-funding marketing team, designed to inject a little fun into the city in wintertime, draw in some crowds, and really just to show off how much great talent there is in Gold Coast (something we've been feeling a real void of... but it is indeed out there!).

The festival kicked off this week with a huge free beach concert - such a lovely way to watch live music. We weren't too familiar with a lot of the acts prior to the event, but apparently the headliner, Pete Murray, is kind of a big thing here in Oz, and lots of the other Aussie indie bands are gaining in popularity fast-- like Clare Bowditch, Busby Marou, and the John Steel Singers. It ran all day in the sand, and though it got a bit chilly at night, everyone bundled together under blankets, sat under the coloured lights and finally the fireworks... which were shot into the sky under a very creepy red moon. A wonderful time! Here are a few photos from the beach concert....


Under the shadows in the afternoon (the white building in the centre is our apartment)

Clare Bowditch

Pete Murray


Creepy red moon


After-show fireworks

Flexing Those Acting Muscles: Part III

2011-06-16T09:00:00.004+10:00

There is more! Yes, one more little piece of filmmaking you won't want to miss...

This time, we are taken deep into a forest, a forest at the mythical Lotus Mountain (which may or may not be otherwise known as Daisy Hill Conservation Area, in Queensland), where two ninjas face off in an epic battle in the woods.

For Adrian's 'Intro to Visual Effects' class, he was assigned to make a short film with a variety of special effects in it. A fun project indeed! And while others in his class mostly made dramas involving teen car crash disasters and ghosts, Adrian took another route: the kung fu movie. Now, unfortunately, Jackie Chan and Chow Yun Fat ended up being busy on the weekend of filming, so it was up to Dayle and our pal Tim to play their roles.

Showdown at White Lotus Mountain from BigQuestionMarks on Vimeo.

A Cold Snap

2011-06-13T12:14:00.118+10:00

Since we're totally not going to believe this happened in a few months (and those of you enjoying sunny summer temperatures in North America won't either), we've decided to write about it: there is indeed WINTER on the Gold Coast. The dreaded W-word!

Yes, when researching our move here, we found climate charts that said the mercury would never fall below 20 degrees (yes!), we Googled street scenes of palm trees and read things about "300+ sunny days per year". Sold! But unfortunately we're not immune, even on the Gold Coast, to the weirdo weather that's been totally confusing everyone around the world this year.

Winter has come to Queensland — something we didn't really think was possible — and we are currently in the middle of quite a cold snap. Word is, Thursday was the coldest day Brisbane has had in a decade (9 degrees for a high!), and it's supposed to continue for another week. On Friday morning for work, I was to help out with the public launch of this community safety campaign, which was taking place outdoors in Cavill Mall, the big pedestrian area smack in the centre of Surfers. Well, I showed up to find my colleagues wearing scarves and with teeth chattering, and the guests and spectators who actually showed up making jokes about "Melbourne weather" and breathing on their hands to keep from freezing. It seemed to take ages for the sun to finally peek over the buildings around 9am, but it was very welcome when it did arrive. Winter has officially arrived — as of June 1st, actually — and while the evening news anchors are yammering on and on about the great ski conditions in New South Wales right now, we'd prefer to go back to our breezy summer weather right now, thank you very much.

And yes, as Canadians, we are indeed used to this kind of miserable grey and cold weather, that's true. And yes, we should stop whining! But when dealing with the cold, it's all about how prepared you are for it. Our apartment is actually colder inside than outside — fantastic in summer, for sure! — as there isn't a speck of insulation in the walls, which are made of concrete and floor-to-ceiling glass windows. Truthfully, we're spending a lot of evenings hiding out under the puffy quilt we splurged on a few weeks' back (a good purchase!) and waiting for it all to blow over (in August maybe?). And as our power bill is expensive enough already, we're not about to head out and get ourselves an electricity-chugging space heater...

On Friday night, our friend Tim came over — Tim lives in a house that is even colder than ours, with fans built into the attic of the house that work constantly to push the hot air out — and after trying to warm ourselves up with some beers while we sat under blankets, we decided to try something we normally wouldn't dare: hit the Surfers Paradise bar scene on a Friday night... to absorb a little body heat, that is. So we threw on about four layers each and made the three-block dash to Cavill Ave. And there we found out how to keep warm in the Australian winter: sheepishly dancing the night away to Top 40. Who would've thought?

Actually, there is one really great thing about winter in Queensland: nobody has a clue how to dress for it. The surf shops are still selling bikinis... but displaying them on mannequins with faux-fur vests over top. It's Ugg-boot city these days. And yesterday I saw a guy in the shopping mall, wearing a puffy sleeping-bag parka, paired with shorts and flip-flops. It's kind of hilarious.

Flexing Those Acting Muscles: Part II

2011-06-11T19:15:00.016+10:00

And oh yes, there is more. We're not sure why our acting skills are in such high demand (although our asking price is pretty low...).

This time, the organization Dayle was working for in Surfers was filming a TV ad for an upcoming event, and the colleague organizing the PR was desperately in need of extras on short notice. All we had to do was show up at Benihana, the Japanese restaurant in the Marriott Hotel, for about 45 minutes on a Thursday morning and look amazed by a teppanyaki chef working his cooking magic. Sure, why not?

Since we were both free that day, we arrived at the very fancy lobby of the Marriott that rainy morning in our snazzy clothes (having been asked to dress as though we were "going 5-star dining"). We had pictured a full restaurant of people, but the setting was a little more intimate than that: it was actually just us and five others, seated around a wide table with a hot grill in the middle of it, huddled around a chef.

Our little nook was gorgeous, we must note, and looked out onto a Japanese garden quite reminiscent of that final dramatic scene from Kill Bill. We only hoped that some samurais would get out there and do a little battle in the rain for us. Or better yet, Uma Thurman and Lucy Liu! And yes, and the restaurant itself was pretty impressive, too.

Unlike us extras, the chef seemed quite comfortable in front of the camera, being used to putting on a show for restaurant patrons every evening with his big teppanyaki blades and forks. He made a steaming volcano out of onion rings, he flipped prawns into his hat, drummed complicated rhythms with his spice canisters, and lit things on fire as we oohed and aahhed and clapped (no acting skills needed there). Then he tossed food at us — and seeing as we hadn't thought to practice catching rice and prawns with our mouths, most of us ended up with foodstuffs all over our fancy clothing. *Le sigh.* In no time at all, the cameraman had tons of footage and told our chef it was cool to stop cooking — but he was intent on making us a full dinner at 10:30am! Finally, we convinced him that he'd done a great job and he could leave his grill behind, and what else could we do? We all pigged out on delicious Japanese grilled dinner and wine (a prop that definitely could not go to waste) not two hours after we'd eaten breakfast. Ah well, the life of an extra!

Even though Adrian was much more keen to be on camera (and got covered with a lot more flying food) Dayle ended up with a foreground spot in the commercial... which was a little hilarious to see on our television, playing in a commercial break during Law and Order. So apparently Dayle's stint on Romper Room wasn't the last of her TV career....

Flexing Those Acting Muscles: Part I

2011-06-07T17:42:00.011+10:00

One thing we didn't plan on doing upon our move to Australia... was getting ourselves in front of any camera lens but our own.

But somehow, in our four months in Oz, between us we've already managed to rack up roles in two TV commercials and one short film (OK, the short film was one of Adrian's projects for class, but still...).

We always like to keep ourselves open to strange and interesting opportunities as they present themselves, and thanks to this we just keep on collecting weird experiences... and bit parts as extras. Plus, it never hurts to have a little more material for the blog. So enjoy...

--------------------------------

Our first video: Adrian's Australian acting debut.

The auditions weren't too tough — in fact, he turned down the part initially when he was approached by talent scouts in Griffith's library. Acting is a very time-consuming pursuit after all, and of course, a lot of energy has to go into playing a role properly. But thanks to Adrian's training in notable full-length Canadian B-grade cinema [title withheld], it wasn't long before Adrian had reconsidered and was prepping in the make-up chair. Catch Adrian acting in his Australian debut as a student at the library (it was a stretch!) about 30 seconds in on this ad for Griffith University....

Adrian's Griffith Commercial

Stay tuned for our next blog, where you can catch Dayle and Adrian dodging flying teppanyaki (on primetime TV no less)!

Hell on Wheels

2011-06-02T23:21:00.000+10:00

There's nothing like the feeling of freedom a bicycle gives you (at least when you're a non-car-owner). When you're going from no wheels to two wheels, suddenly many more places are within reach, travel times are slashed dramatically, and all the while you're getting some exercise. It was certainly our mode of choice in Toronto, where biking often beat the subway to the destination!

My new wheels at my favourite stretch of beach

We've both been contemplating buying used bikes for a while now, but hadn't gotten around to yet. Last Thursday I'd finally had enough of being limited by my feet and the mysterious ways of the Gold Coast bus system, and hopped on Gumtree (the Aussie equivalent of Craigslist). Within minutes I found a whole bunch of used bikes for under $100. Sweet! There was one bike that looked particularly good (despite being pink and purple and having a "Miss Cool" sticker on it) for just $65.00. I called up the seller and it turned out they had a number of used bikes on offer, and they were only about a half hour's stroll from our apartment. So the next day, I moseyed on down to Broadbeach Waters, wondering what kind of bike theft ring these likely crackheads must have going for them (after all, who is available anytime during a Friday other than students and crackheads?), and soon found myself horribly cursing my own cynicism. Instead, I met a retired couple with a lovely house on one of the canals, who fix up bicycles as a hobby for a little pocket money. They were actually really sweet (though I'm still not entirely sure where they get all the bikes from) and after trying out a few choices, I ended up with a slightly shabby-looking 10-speed that felt great on the road and had these awesome higher handlebars (extra comfortable for those long beachside rides, said the lady). And it was $45. Nothing a little spray paint couldn't fix. Woohoo!

There were too many things to do over the weekend to take my new wheels for a spin, but as soon as Monday rolled around, it was definitely time to explore some (formerly) unreachable Gold Coast corners I'd been itching to check out: The Spit, for one.

The view south from the end of The Spit

The Spit is a long strip of land a little north of us that runs along the ocean and extends beyond the suburbs of Surfers and posh Main Beach (home of Palazzo Versace, Versace's own Gold Coast hotel) and Sea World, and looks pretty uninhabited on our maps. It separates the ocean from "The Broadwater", a wide but calm inlet where many people keep their boats. Word is there's great snorkeling somewhere along The Spit, too. So I hopped on the bike path that stretches along the beachfront and cruised along the shore — waves on my right, beautifully smooth pavement underneath. For those of you used to biking around Toronto, you'd probably understand that the Gold Coast's lack of potholes, curbside junk, and big cracks in the pavement are a real treat! What does suck about biking around the Gold Coast is that bike paths suddenly vanish for no apparent reason, there's a lot of roundabouts, and road bike lanes are a little random as well. Nonetheless, cycling is about taking things as they come. And there was plenty to see on the way — the beachside caravan park we stayed in back in 2008, Donatella's hotel, a fishermen's co-op, a posh marina, Sea World's roller coaster and resort, and tons of birds. Finally, the road ended at a parking lot that was surprisingly full of cars for a Monday afternoon.
People were fishing from boulders along the seaway, and surfers paddled in from the ocean. Two people were having a private surf lesson on the beautiful dune-lined beach, and lots of people bro
ught their dogs along to have a frolic (dogs aren't allowed on most of the beaches here). Looking south, you could see the skyscraper hotels of Surfers faintly off in the distance, but this place felt very natural and far from any of the built-up-ness of where we live. You could just feel that the people who visited this place really appreciated having a slice of nature so close to home. I certainly did.

Cute & chirpy little thing!

There was still a long ride ahead of me, though: next stop on my route was Southport (sort of the business centre of the area), to get the old bike kitted up. Though clearly visible directly across from The Spit, there is only one bridge to Southport that joins the two bits of land — and it's way south of both The Spit and Southport, in Main Beach. The scene along the way back was even prettier with the sun sinking: orange light along The Broadwater, the birds getting more chirpy as sundown approached. About 7.8 kilometres later (yes, I looked it up), I find myself in Bicycle World in Southport, checking out prices of bike baskets (eek! $39 at the cheapest!) and gel seats ($80- ouch!) and oogling the many gorgeous shiny hipster bikes for sale (but if I'm only going to use mine for a year, there's no way I'm shelling out $600!). Guess I'm not a bourgeois cyclist after all, though maybe I'll get a really cool bike the next time I'm sure I'm staying somewhere for a long time. After settling on a fitting — and more affordable — bell decorated with the words "I love my bike" and a water bottle holder, I scooted over to K-Mart's bike section instead at the shopping mall. No luck on the basket, but at least I scored a mediocre gel seat cover for my aching bottom. The last 6 km back to Surfers were definitely the toughest (note to self, next time bring a snack!), but in all, after my 22-kilometre maiden voyage, I can safely say I think my new bike and I going to make a great team!

You can check out my route on my biking Google Map — I made it partly because I was dying of curiosity about how far I'd pedaled. Turned out it was further than I thought! Guess maybe I should invest in one of those tripometers, too. -D.

View Dayle's Biking Adventures in a larger map

The Death of Surfers?

2011-05-28T20:53:00.014+10:00

For the past few weeks, I've been doing a bit of work for an organization in Surfers Paradise that works with city council to organize events and marketing for the suburb. It's been one of the most interesting jobs I've had, mostly because what I've learned in this short time about our town is astounding.

Surfers Paradise is a beautiful place on the beach, built on tourism and living perpetually in holiday mode. It's full of restaurants, hotels, shopping, and attractions like mini golf and wax museums, and the weather is pretty great year-round. For decades, it's been the place Aussies would holiday to with their families, it's the place where high school kids celebrate the end of their school years (Schoolies Week) and it's where international backpackers come to party, enroll in English courses, and soak up the sun. People come to have fun here, and then they come back again because it's such a great place to be. This has been going on for years and years, and so construction companies just kept building, and people keep opening more businesses up here. But realistically, this kind of success couldn't really go on forever.

These days Surfers is full of "For Lease" signs on storefronts and "Vacancy" broadcasted from hotel signs. It seems more and more shops are disappearing all the time, and the sidewalks are sometimes empty enough to envision a tumbleweed blowing through. There's even a totally vacant shopping mall on the main street, hidden behind a few shops that are still open (for now at least). We've been noticing this more and more the longer we stay, but what truly hammered in this point was taking on a work assignment where I ended up chatting up local business owners and managers about the state of Surfers.

Contest at Sin City nightclub

No one is entirely sure of the real reason why Surfers has lost so many visitors, but the consensus is, business began getting slower in the last three years or so and is now at an all-time low. And something's gotta give! Is it the global economy keeping international visitors away? Is the high Aussie dollar simply making it a better deal for Australians to holiday in Bali instead? Or has Surfers simply lost its former lustre/sense of fun/wholesomeness? Some say that Surfers has become too much of a party town, gotten a really bad reputation, and now families are staying away or heading to other suburbs on the Gold Coast (well, with a bar strip full of drunken hooligans roaming the street nearly every night, and some nightclubs offering a contest to win a boob job, it's no wonder). Others say that town planners and restaurants are trying to get too fancy/expensive and it's forcing families to eat at KFC when they holiday — we'd have to agree with this argument too, as we've been unable to rationalize spending a small fortune ($20 a plate AT LEAST) on a Thai or an Italian dinner. Some are saying that we need to encourage locals from other suburbs to visit, but the city keeps raising the cost of street parking ($2 an hour now I'm told) in Surfers but not in other suburbs, which is working against promoting local business as well. And it's not just Surfers that is suffering: newspapers are reporting Gold Coast with the highest unemployment rate in Australia (government reports are saying it's around 7%, though some are saying it's probably closer to 13% unemployment — some timing for our arrival!), thanks to both the lull in tourism and the collapse of some of the biggest construction companies/investors.

It's not happy days for Surfers Paradise, but underneath all of that, what I encountered most in longtime locals was a real nostalgia for what the place once was (it was the most exciting place in Australia to spend a week, or simply a laid-back beach town, etc.) and a strong belief that it'll make a comeback, with some careful resuscitation. Some people think some twinkly lights along the streets might liven up the atmosphere. Some say we need a better arts culture (me included) and perhaps some quality entertainment, beyond buskers (ugh)— like a music festival to get people coming back. Agreed! I've actually just signed on to work with the same organization for the next few months (I start my new job this week!), to help run the upcoming Surfers Paradise Festival in June/July and a bunch more events following that, so I'm extra excited now to find out what will happen to this place. And I'm not quite sure when it happened, but I think somewhere along the way, perhaps while I was meeting so many lovely locals, and discovering all the hidden gems of this weird and wonderful place, I think I'm starting to lose a little piece of my heart in this town, too. -D.

Update time!

2011-05-18T21:56:00.004+10:00

Whew! Where has the time gone? It's hard to believe it's been a month since we were chasing Snoop Dogg around town, and a month since we last updated the blog. Since then, Surfers (and the Gold Coast in general) has really emptied out — the tourists have all gone home to work, Adrian's been buckling down to schoolwork, and Dayle's been getting to know the hidden corners of the Gold Coast via some temp jobs. Temperatures have plummeted (a cold snap blew cold air in from Antarctica last week, sending nighttime temperatures down to as low as 9 degrees — eek!) and though we've given up our ocean swims and surfing for now, we're still bundling up and BBQing as much as we can — with scarves on, that is (OK, OK, you got us, it's not exactly as bad as the photo you see here...). We've also began to broaden our personal boundaries and have started to explore beyond Surfers. We've summed up some of our adventures below, so do scroll down in our blog and do a little backtracking with us! And while you're at it, loyal readers, tell us what you're up to as well — feel free to leave us comments below our posts, or email us at our personal emails or at thebigquestionmark[at]gmail[dot]com. Hope you're all doing fine and dandy!

Weekend Exploring: Burleigh Heads

2011-05-09T20:56:00.009+10:00

This past weekend we thought we'd do something a little different and check out a Gold Coast suburb we'd been hearing good things about: Burleigh Heads. We're actually still trying to figure out what the name "Gold Coast" encompasses — from what we gather, it's a 'city' made up of a whole bunch of suburbs sprawling along the Pacific coast, and also a whole bunch of inland suburbs, too. We're not totally sure how far north or south the Gold Coast stretches — perhaps to New South Wales on the south end, and nearly to Brisbane in the north? If anyone knows, please tell us! (Check out these map s here, or click on the map, right, to enlarge) But we do know that there's a lot more to Gold Coast than just Surfers Paradise, where we live. People around here tend to have many great things to say about Burleigh Heads (as opposed to lots of bad things about Surfers, but we'll get to that in another blog), so on Sunday, we hopped on a city bus and made the 30-minute trip south.

Burleigh is indeed a totally different world from Surfers. When the bus drops you off in the centre of town, instead of concrete skyscraper hotels, tall coniferous trees line the beach. There are a couple of streets full of laid-back cafes, takeaway restaurants (including an Indonesian one, which we're going to have to return to try!), and lots of little shops. We did a wander and counted maybe five butchers on as many streets. And hippies — plenty of hippie types roaming about. A few weeks ago, Dayle had asked a co-worker at her temp job where the best breakfast was to be found on the coast, and Danelle rhymed off a few spots, and they were all in Burleigh. So step one was to fill our bellies with delicious breakfast. We settled on the Pantry Cafe, the second place we checked out, finding a giant and inventive breakfast menu (Adrian had some sort of eggs and yummy spiced "mince" and Dayle had something like Eggs Florentine but with Turkish bread and asparagus rather than spinach- amazing!) And there's nothing like eating your breakfast outdoors under blue skies in perfect 25 degree weather! While people-watching, of course.

After our breakfast out, we wandered Burleigh's streets a bit — finding 3 or 4 more amazing-looking breakfast spots, cool independent clothing shops, vegetarian eateries, and a vintage theatre that had been converted into a tiny mall with restaurants and shops inside — and we continued our walk in search of Burleigh Heads' other great attraction: a seaside national park encompassing the headland right in the middle of town! It wasn't too hard to find, being the giant green hump by the ocean, and Burleigh Head National Park ended up being as lovely as we'd heard, too. Perhaps especially so, after being in the concrete jungle of Surfers for two months already. But either way, it sure is nice to hop on a trail and wander through the rainforest for an afternoon.

Being Mother's Day, a lot of families were out and about, so we probably didn't see as much wildlife as we could have on a weekday, but we came across some decent-sized spiders, a brush turkey kicking around in the dead leaves, plenty of butterflies, and a lot of interesting flowers. We were definitely happy to have Dayle's awesome camera back and ready for snapping (after a long hunt for a new battery charger). There are two trails in the park: an ocean rim track (1.2km one way) with great views all the way around the headland (where in winter and spring you can see humpback whales!) to the mouth of a river on the other side , and a rainforest loop (2.3km) that winds up and down through the awesome forest. We pretty much walked them all before heading down to a grassy north-facing hill overlooking the ocean and the town, where groups of people were sprawled out on the grass, soaking up the late-afternoon sun, watching the surfers below and drinking sparkling wine out of plastic flutes. It was a gorgeous scene. We had come prepared with some brie and a baguette, just in case we came across a good picnic spot, and I'm pretty sure we found one of the best picnic spots on earth! And to think that this was all waiting for us, a $3 bus ride (or $1.50 for students like Adrian), just five suburbs away. Needless to say, it was a little hard to leave, but we're sure we'll be heading back to Burleigh Heads again someday soon.

Culture Sponges

2011-04-27T16:13:00.008+10:00

To kick off Adrian's mid-semester break, we figured it was about time to get a little culture. The Gold Coast is beautiful and all, but we're realizing more and more that we're truly city people. And although many people call the Gold Coast a "city", we'll argue that a place without museums, an art scene, live concerts, intriguing bars and cafes (in our opinion at least), a Chinatown, or any old buildings just isn't really a city. Lucky for us, Brisbane, Queensland's capital city, is only about an hour and a half away by train. So we hopped on the train early Easter Saturday, and made a beeline for Brissie's museums and skyscrapers.

Actually, Brisbane isn't entirely new to us — we visited Brisbane 3 or 4 times on our last Australia trip, but only to visit people, dash to the airport, or run exciting errands like filing tax returns. And just the week before Easter (this year), we actually ended up in Brissie by accident, when we took a wrong turn on the highway on the way to a farmers' market with our friend Tim, and ended up downtown. But this day was our first of our real exploring — grabbing a map and soaking it all up, just like sponges.

Brisbane's CBD was totally what we were craving: oooold ornate buildings (OK, not Europe-old, but Australia-old!), stately downtown shopping malls, stores selling cufflinks and high-end men's business clothes, pedestrian streets, and people everywhere! In a flash, we'd found a camera shop selling a Canon battery charger I was having one hell of a time sourcing in Oz, Starbucks frappuccinos, and signed a petition against animal testing. We soon reached the Brisbane River, a wide ribbon of water that loops through the city centre (and can be credited with some of the flood footage you would have seen back in January). Crossing over the bridge to Southbank, the views were pretty awesome, and we tried to imagine what it was like when the river was carrying boats and pontoons swiftly out to sea...

We'd heard great things about the "21st Century: Art in the First Decade" exhibition, which was about to close at the Gallery of Modern Art (aka the GoMA). It was a totally unique exhibit, and so cool to see some work by great present-day artists, as we're usually looking back at artists from previous decades and centuries, even. We only wished we had two days to spend wandering the exhibition, which was a collection of works by present-day artists from all around the world. Highlights included a massive 'cloud' of plastic shopping bags (Pascale Marthine Tayou, Cameroon), a cardboard-box installation, a piece by exiled Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, and a performance by an "iPhone Orchestra" (seriously!). A lot of it was really interactive, like a huge table of skyscrapers made of white Lego being constantly rebuilt into new forms; Rivane Neuenschwander’s (of Brazil) I wish your wish had visitors making wishes on paper and swapping their wish for someone else's wish, which was printed on ribbon and hung on a huge wall (somehow we both ended up choosing "I wish to travel through time and space"); a postcard sending project, and all kinds of other cool concepts and ideas. And it was all free! [Sadly, I don't think we would never find an exhibit this good — and free — at the AGO in Toronto!]

We still had a few big things on the to-do list, and kept wandering. Turns out Southbank is a pretty great place to hang out — there were tons of people out at the huge park along the river, which was almost finished from the post-floods fix-up. The Southbank Markets were really cool — full of way better arts/crafts/fashion than you'd see at the Surfers Paradise night markets each week, for sure. And there were so many great spots to stop and have a snack or a beer! We were introduced to Fat Yak ale and we're big fans since...

As it got dark, we found ourselves crossing the river again, this time ending up in the Botanical Gardens, where we met an interesting fellow that gave us a good rundown of what those flood days were like, pointing out scraps of plastic bags and debris still in trees. As we started to get really hungry for dinner, we found ourselves totally lost in a part of the map that looked fairly ordinary — reminding us of our least favourite part about Australian cities: street names often change by the block and there's absolutely no grid or logic to the majority of the urban planning. We ran into a Kiwi couple in the same boat as us, and somehow found our way to Fortitude Valley, where the plan was to have a nice-ish dinner (too hungry- went for Grill'd burgers!) and check out the nightlife (Adrian was promptly turned away from a bar because he was wearing shorts!). But anyway, it was a long and eventful day where we got a good taste of Brisvegas. And little did we know, we'd be back two days later to have some Anzac Day beers — with a lot of sailors! — under the massive Storey Bridge, at the Storey Bridge Hotel. It's certainly no New York, but it'll definitely do for an urban fix while we're living down in Gold Coast!

Adventures in Snoopville

2011-04-14T12:10:00.004+10:00

If anyone's wondering where Snoop Dogg is right now, don't worry, we've found him. Yes, just in case you're wondering, he's just hanging out in...um... Southport.

I learned this after finding myself in a totally new part of Gold Coast yesterday, attending to an appointment in the nearby suburb of Southport. Until now, Southport — which is a little north of us and just inland of the ocean — was just a place with a big shopping mall (Australia Fair) that the bus careens through on its way to Griffith University.

Southport is Gold Coast's main business area, and if you don't look across the lagoon (the inland waterway that known as "The Broadwater") at Sea World, is totally absent of the touristy vibe of Surfers Paradise. At 3:30 in the afternoon, the streets and the mall are filled with uniformed schoolkids, skateboarders, and office workers in collared shirts and heels. With low buildings and street-level shops lining the sidewalks, and benches positioned under big leafy tropical trees, it's got a bit of a tropical country town feel to it. Then throw in a dash of urban America — think vacant storefronts and lots of bargain warehouse shopping and a few hoodlumish types hanging about... and you've got Southport. Think Cairns, Australia crossed with Buffalo, New York (and maybe throw in a dash of Tully, QLD for that true tropical country-town feel). It's a weird place.

Fast-forward to 6pm: I'm in the moisturizer aisle of Chemist Warehouse, trying to make a choice amidst the endless shelves of skin products, when I catch a snippet of conversation from the pharmacy counter:

"So, really, you just saw Snoop Dogg? Like where?"
"Yeahhhhh, he was just here."
"Here in Southport? But where? What was he like in person?"
"Yeah, they've been talking about him a lot on the radio lately..."

That's when my brain interrupted with a whole lot of "Huh? Snoop Dogg? Really? Here in Southport? Wait, which moisturizer was I just looking at?" and unfortunately accidentally tuned out all the good stuff of the conversation (if there was any). And that's when my internal paparazzi grabbed hold, made my purchases for me, and led me out onto the street. First I saw a group of teenagers in cornrows and big t-shirts gathered in a group — aha! Snoop must be in there somewhere. I walked by very slowly and it turned out they were just gathered around a cell phone that was playing music.

And then I saw Happy High Herbs, a shop which I'd passed by earlier. Eureka! Where else would Snoop Dogg hang out? I reached the shop and peered inside, getting my camera ready.... and saw a lot of rainbow, and a couple of hippies. Strike two!

I started to think perhaps I had imagined the whole Snoop Dogg conversation as I wandered a bit more through the now-creepy streets of Southport in the dark, and decided to call it quits on my futile search. Because, thinking about it more in depth, I started to wonder why someone like Snoop Dogg would come to the bustling metropolis that is Southport.

But as soon as I got home, internet sleuth Adrian was on the case. And fo' shizzle... Snoop is in the neighbourhood! Just check out his tweets and the local news. Apparently he was just doing a little bit — $25,000 worth — of shopping. At least the Aussie government let him in this time. (Thanks Russell Crowe!) Well, maybe we'll run into him today instead.

The Other Reason

2011-04-07T17:55:00.005+10:00

Wow, more than a month has passed now since we made our big move to the Gold Coast, and it is still pretty great. We've probably droned on about the beach enough to make you all roll your eyes and make pukey faces, and whenever people ask us the reason we made the move, we'd still probably answer, "the beach," or perhaps "the warm climate". But, in case any of you are on the fence right now, thinking hard about relocating somewhere warm, we've got another, very awesome reason for you. The fruit!

Yes, over the past few weeks we've been enjoying the most delicious, perfect avocados we've ever seen. And these are apparently the "battered" ones, the cyclone survivors. Sadly, Australia lost a massive amount of produce during all the weather disasters during the past few months. It's probably an awful time to be a farmer here — but then again, is there ever a good time to be a commercial farmer in this crazy country?

We're not sure how much an avocado used to cost in the grocery stores here — it's between $1.50 and $1.78 an avocado at the moment — but it's worth it for our new favourite breakfast — avocado and tomato, with cheese melted over top on an English muffin. Yum! And we've been spending a lot of time drooling over recipes on this website.

Bananas are another story. Delicious as they are, it's pretty hard to pay $12.98 a kilogram for bananas when we remember them being more like 49 cents a pound back in Canada (just over $1/kg). There's a touching little notice posted next to the outrageous banana price signs at both of our local supermarkets, explaining how most of the country's banana crop was wiped out from Cyclone Yasi, but we should keep buying what's left and do our part to help Aussie farmers. And of course, these bananas can't compare to the bargain ones shipped across the entire continent of North America while still green, and sprayed with gases to ripen at just the right time on the truck. But still...

So when we found cute little lady finger bananas for sale at a stall at the local Carrara Markets this past weekend for $6 a kilo, we were stoked! They looked a little beat up so we didn't buy very many — even though the lady at the booth assured us we shouldn't worry about the deep black scrapes in the peel, which were "left by the flying foxes" (or bats, to our Canadian readers). But now we're wishing we bought enough to fill a backpack! These lady finger bananas are tasty little things... and the lady at the market was right — the marks were purely surface blemishes. And the other amazing thing about these bananas is that they were grown in Tweed Valley, only 50 km south of where we live. Forget eating apples all winter because it's all we've got while the fields and the trees are buried under the snow. If there was ever a good time and place to try out the 100-Mile Diet, subtropical Queensland would be it! If you're looking for us this weekend, we'll probably be at a farmer's market somewhere. Or maybe imagining up new avocado recipes.

Third Time's a Charm?

2011-04-06T11:41:00.001+10:00

Today began in the best way imaginable — with a little surfing! While Adrian headed off to school, flatmate Julie and I decided to brave the waves before getting to our daily business. And even though our flatmates both own surfboards, I was happy to learn that we're all at around the same level in surfing- extreme beginner!

Adrian and I have hit the waves twice now since we arrived in Gold Coast, with varying degrees of success. On our first day surfing, we tried desperately to remember those little tidbits of surfer wisdom from our lessons in Coffs Harbour back in 2008. The waves here are a lot bigger than in Coffs and have a strong sweep sideways, meaning it's a battle to stay anywhere close to your original spot on the beach. That day, neither of us managed to stand, but we had fun flopping onto the board, beached-whale-style and riding the waves in on our bellies. Aside from mildly sore ribcages from all that flopping, we were ready to try it again. (Note: this is absolutely not one of us in the photo below)

We took a day to rest our aching muscles (we forgot that surfing is hard work!) and headed out again the day after that. We returned to the same spot, as it had a nice shallow sandbar that was pretty easy to paddle out to the first day. However, I'm not sure if the waves were bigger or how the conditions had changed, but it seemed so much more difficult that day. And while Adrian made it past the sandbar and even managed to stand up on his board (yay!), I found myself stuck in that horrible spot right by the shore where the waves crashed, unable to get past them and, to make things worse, kept getting whacked by my surfboard! A couple puffy knees (see left), a big purple fin-mark on my thigh, and a bump on the head later (lucky me!), we decided to give the surfing thing a bit of a break....

But nearly two weeks since that memorable day, my knees are back to their usual selves, so when Julie was pondering a morning surf, it seemed like about time to give it another go. I don't want to be developing some kind of ocean phobia when I'm only a month into our stint in Gold Coast, after all!

It was cloudy and a bit windy this morning, and we got to the beach and realized neither of us had any idea how to pick a good (ie. easy) spot. Finally, we just picked a place to jump in and were soon back on the beach in defeat, as the waves were huge! Not ready to give up though, we tried another plan- ask a lifeguard! We figured if anyone would know the waves, the guys who watch the beach would. It was a little hard explaining that we just wanted a spot with "very small waves", as most people here head straight for the giant tube waves that seem miles from shore. The lifeguard guy looked around and said it all looked "pretty ordinary" (eek, really?!) but after I repeated the words "beginner" and "easy" enough times, he got it, and pointed us toward a flatter spot down the beach where the waves were crashing further from the shore and some lady was riding a boogie board. Aha!

Turns out asking a lifeguard is the way to go, as neither Julie nor I got beaten up by our surfboards or swallowed gallons of water. It was a lot of fun! And even though we are still too terrible to jump up and stand on our boards (plus, swimming against the crazy sweep is really tiring!), we had a good time and at least rode few waves in on our stomachs. We agree it's definitely a way more fun type of exercise than going for a run, however, I'm reminded once again of having weakling arms - which are all wobbly now, and yet don't even have the power to push me into a standing position on my surfboard. Bah! But we'll see how Attempt #4 goes...

Buggered!

2011-03-29T21:43:00.001+11:00

Last week a funny thing happened on the Gold Coast. It's usually pretty breezy here, but one day the wind died down and was replaced by other sounds- a faint buzzing, the occasional "whap!", and we started noticing these large shiny black beetles that were suddenly EVERYWHERE, buzzing around, flying into things, and creating mild havoc here on the coast.

I'm not sure if they arrived here gradually or what. My first encounter with these creatures was on one of my long beach walks south along the shoreline to the neighbouring suburb of Broadbeach. It's always fun to see what the ocean has washed up on the beach in the morning - sometimes it's jellyfish, sometimes seashells, but I got to this one patch that Tuesday morning last week and it was black - and as I grew close I could see it was absolutely covered in squirming beetles, almost the size of your thumb, who mostly were stuck on their backs, trying desperately to flip themselves back over, as beetles do. I snapped a few photos and the beetle patch was over in a couple metres, and I was soon carrying on my business like usual.

Wednesday evening was hellishly hot and sticky, so after a long day of running around, crossing things off the to-do list, I decided to go for swim before Adrian got back from school. I was just finishing my first lap as the sun dipped lower when I felt something pinching the inside of my upper arm. I looked...and screamed! There was one of those beetles, latched onto my arm... I flailed around in the pool, trying to shoo it away, as I noticing a couple other beetles swimming in my direction. Aren't bugs supposed to die when they fall in the pool? It was hard enough to shake off its iron grip, while trying to only scream quietly so the family in the next pool wouldn't come running and find me in my bug-attack distress. Once I was safely out of the water, I noticed more of the beetles flying in and - PLOOP! - diving straight into the pool with glee.

After that, I stayed away from the pool, but we started noticing these things everywhere- in fact, there were parts of the beach that were almost solid black- like, where did these things come from? And they not only swim, but they fly too, and then they just die soon after they hit the ground, so you can't walk around in bare feet (as everyone does here!), or you'll step on a million beetle carcasses.

Our local paper, the Gold Coast Bulletin, called it a FREAK BEETLE PLAGUE. On Saturday, the front page had a picture of a man in a hospital bed with the (very awesome and Toronto Sun-like) headline "BUG-GERED)"... and the story goes that apparently this guy was riding his bike down the road, riding over what he thought was an oil slick, but it was in fact a pile of these beetles (which have been swept to the sides of the streets 3x a day by city council street sweepers). His bike went skidding and he crashed badly, thanks to these stupid beetles.

All we know right now is it's not at all a normal occurrence and that our local environmental people are puzzled that we're suddenly inundated by these freshwater beetles along the coast (but at least it explains the many beach deaths). And that it's such a hilarious/weird/scary problem to have. And that was just last week; this week it's been giant grasshoppers flying into our apartment... who knows what's next?

For more, check out: Beetles take over Surfers Paradise

Our Favourite Gold Coast Bloke (So Far)

2011-03-21T18:51:00.006+11:00

It was a partly cloudy but hot afternoon. We were indulging in an ice cream at the local Cold Rock Ice Creamery (delicious ice cream but bad value, we must say). There we were, sitting at a sidewalk table, when you swaggered up to the ice cream counter with your family and ordered first.

You ordered first, and then you passed your wife the task of paying for your sundae.

We couldn't stop staring at your multi-coloured mullet. And your awesome 'stache. And then we noticed that you weren't really wearing socks at all- it was simply the best sock tan we'd ever seen.

Mullet man with the rockin' sock tan, we love that you stepped straight out of the '70s to totally make our day!

Our New Flatmate

2011-03-17T12:46:00.003+11:00

We haven't told you too much about our new home yet. It was actually only the second place Adrian checked out on his first apartment-hunting day, but as soon as he saw it, he knew it was the one. And as soon as he emailed me the photos (as I was still in Canada at the time), I shrieked with excitement. It's a huge, furnished two-bedroom with tons of light, a wraparound balcony with a panorama showing the mountains on the west side, and ocean on the east, and lots of other high-rises all around us. We've got luxuries we've never had before, like a washing machine and a dishwasher, and three (yes, three!) swimming pools, two tennis courts, and a whole bunch of BBQs. And did we mention it's just across the road from the beach? OK, OK, we'll stop mentioning that already. :)

We're sharing the place until the end of July with Julie & Liv, from Denmark & Norway- they're also Griifth U students, like Adrian, and are fantastic. It's a bit of change, going from having your own apartment to sharing one with flatmates, but somehow, happily, this transition has been a surprisingly easy one. But then, yesterday we got news of a third, slightly more uninvited flatmate who's lately been making himself at home in our new apartment...
---

"Oh yeah, and look out for a bird flying into the apartment," Julie said as she and Liv were heading off for school. "A WHAT??" I replied.

Apparently this black-and-white bird - a magpie-lark, to be exact - scared Julie half to death the day before when she returned home to find it flapping around our living room. Since we generally leave our balcony doors open to let in the sea breeze (as there are no screen doors) and we're about level with some of the trees on the fifth floor, I guess our place is also fair game for the birds. And here I was marvelling at the fact that we never encounter any bugs!

I was sure the apartment bird had to have been a one-time event. So yesterday I open the door after my morning walk on the beach, and am relieved to not witness any flapping, or chirping, for that matter. I'm just sitting down on the couch with a glass of water when I see it - bird crap on the top of one of our faux-leather armchairs. Aha! Well, maybe it was from the day before...

So later on, I'm catching up on some emails in the living room and have all but forgotten about the bird. But I glance up from the computer screen and something catches my eye to the right of me - and I see that just behind the couch, a little black-and-white bird is strutting calmly around the carpet.

It took a surprising amount of yelling, clapping, and shooing (with a mop, even!), but I finally got the thing out of our apartment. The neighbours must have been wondering what all the fuss was about. But I must have scared it, as it didn't come back for the rest of the day. But then today, sometime during the five minutes between the time Adrian and I made our coffees and left the kitchen, and Julie & Liv returned from their morning run, we heard yelling in the living room: our sassy little houseguest had returned... and not for the last time.

So I guess no apartment is absolutely perfect. Some of them come with mice, some with cockroaches, and then there was that pesky flies-in-the-drains problem at our last place in Toronto. And how about our cabin in the woods with all the Huntsman spiders and moths? But a bird in the apartment is a totally new issue. Perhaps we'll have to make ourselves a scarecrow for this one.

Living in Holidayville

2011-03-14T15:58:00.005+11:00

It's been a whole week now since the plane dropped me off at one of the country's best beaches (and that's two weeks on the coast now for Adrian, after a week in Brisbane) and I have to say, the Gold Coast so far is pretty awesome.

Where? Well, the Gold Coast is in fact a decent-sized city (or at least a collection of smaller suburbs strung along the coast) located about an hour south of Brisbane, at the very southernmost end of Queensland, Australia. We're a good few hours' drive north of Sydney and we're nowhere near the tropical Far North, where we once lived (in Port Douglas). But the climate is subtropical and beautiful year-round, and is one of Australia's most popular holiday destinations. Where we live, in Surfers Paradise, is at the epicentre of the Gold Coast's hotels, clubs, souvenir shops, and Vegas-esque glitter.

It's actually a little unreal, living in a place that's perpetually on holidays. I mean, there are definitely others like us, who go to work or school, and still live a few steps from the beach, but there aren't many gloomy faces around, as most of the town's population is on vacation.

Living in a tourist destination also has its drawbacks, of course, like really overpriced restaurants, tacky bars, and getting harassed daily by sales agents on the street to go on a "Nightclub Tour". But my plan is to soak up the holiday spirit and chill out for at least my first week or two in Oz, so it works fine for me.

Most days on the Gold Coast - at least from what I've seen - start out sunny and warm. The weather seems to change throughout the day between sunny and cloudy, and sometimes we get a bit of rain (though usually if you get caught in it, it feels quite nice!). The temperature seems to stay between 25 and 28 degrees, and the ocean temperature is pretty nice too. Which means, as a holidaymaker, you've got a big decision ahead of you: ocean or pool?

Since the sun really starts revving up by around 10am or so, in my opinion, it's best to get your beach time in in the morning (OK, I can see why I'm way paler than everyone else here), and save the errands and business stuff for the afternoon. But just don't forget that banks close at 4pm and everything else seems to shut shortly after that. It's Queensland after all! For that reason, I am happy to be in a tourist town, since tourists love to continue shopping until after dark, and luckily we've got a multi-storey outdoor mall at the centre of Surfers.

And somewhere in between the swimming, shopping, and suntanning, one must make time for a little surfing! It's next on our to-do list, although we remember the waves being a little intimidating on the Gold Coast. We've also managed to squeeze a few delicious barbeques in (there are a number of barbequing areas in the nicely landscaped grounds to our building) and to have some excellent people-watching sessions (more about that to come).

But I guess the best thing so far about living in the Gold Coast is the attitude- lots of smiles, and friendly people in shops, in the elevator, and on the beach. It's just refreshing, after living in much-more-reserved Toronto, to be in a place like this, where people have no qualms about striking up a chat with a total stranger. But of course, when you're pumped so full of the sunshine vitamin all the time, who wouldn't be all smiles and chattiness?

And Around We Go!

2011-03-08T15:58:00.008+11:00

As I was wandering up the beach today in the early morning sunshine, snapping photos of little purplish jellyfish washing up in the surf and following seagull tracks in the freshly groomed sand, four words popped into my head and blinked at me like a neon sign: This is your life.

It wasn't even 8:30 yet, and I was already at the beach. After an early-morning payphone call home to Canada, it was hard to resist taking the beach route back to my apartment. And while normally my first and biggest concern at this hour is getting some breakfast into my belly, pronto, when there's a stunning beach literally at your doorstep, the eggs and toast tend to drop in the priority list.

Yes it's true, folks: we're now official residents of Gold Coast, Australia (well, Surfers' Paradise, to be exact)! It's not a place Adrian and I ever would have pictured ourselves living, but, well, it's happening. For those of you who know us well, you probably know that Australia still holds a special place in our hearts. After spending two eventful years in Oz, it really began to feel like home. And after a good jaunt around Southeast Asia in 2009, we did give returning to Toronto a fair go. But after nearly a year and a half, it became apparent that our old city just wasn't working for us. So despite the fact there were many things we loved about being back in Toronto - like our great little apartment tucked in between Little Italy and Little Portugal, beautiful Trinity-Bellwoods Park down the block, Chinatown just a short walk away, family in nearby towns and lots of great friends in the city - we couldn't help but dig around for ideas for our next adventure. If you had asked us a year ago where we were planning to be in March 2011, we would have told you "Somewhere in the UK", as we were well on our way to getting the paperwork together to take a working holiday in jolly old England at that time. In fact, Adrian got his visa and COULD fly into London right now and be legal to work - that is, if there were jobs. A little detail that scared us off that plan...

So last summer, we began pondering some other options. That was when one of our friends, who knows Australia well, and our desire to return too, asked us: "well, how about going to university there?" Since we'd already used up our two years of Aussie working holiday visas, we'd kind of assumed a return to Oz was out of the question. But we were intrigued. We soon learned Adrian's diploma program at Seneca College had a joint agreement with several universities to upgrade his Digital Media Arts diploma into a degree - at places including York University in Toronto, Athabasca (Alberta), some place in Buffalo, and Griffith University in Australia. What luck! And getting a bachelor's might not be a bad idea careerwise... but after some more research and digging around, it began to look like a crazy plan (financially at least), so we tucked that idea away for the time being...

But crazy as the idea seemed, the more we thought about it, the more we wanted to make it happen. Griffith was located in the Gold Coast after all, a great place to surf, with fantastic year-round weather, and close to Brisbane, a city we've been hearing lots of good things about. So we thought, why not? And we began the application process: apply to school, apply for scholarships, apply for visas... and finally, at the very end of January, when we had already given our landlord move-out notice and had sold most of our furniture (yet still waiting for the Aussie gov't to say we were allowed back!), the news came: we got our visas! We jumped up and down a lot, and started making those last preparations. Though our plans had been in the works for quite a while, with just over two weeks left until Adrian's final enrollment deadline at Griffith, it sure was cutting it close!

But in the end, we made it. We both spent some good family/friend time before heading off, and even managed to score some decent deals on flights (note: if you're looking for a last-minute flight to Oz, definitely try Expedia, or check Air New Zealand or Virgin's websites!). Adrian landed in Australia on February 18, and I landed yesterday morning. For me, it's still pretty unreal- for one, we're living in holiday land! The Gold Coast is very flashy and touristy, full of high-rises, and makes me think a lot of Hawaii 5-0. And secondly, we're living in a gorgeous apartment that's a half block from the ocean. Our balcony wraps around our entire living room, giving us views of the mountains inland, and the sparkling blue ocean on the other side. We've got until August 2012 to live in Oz, and this morning I promised myself I would not begin to take that for granted! And so our newest adventure begins...
xoxo, D.

Feeling like Nacho Libre...

2010-10-30T16:28:00.000+11:00

Woohoo! It's one of the most exciting days of the year today — the day before Halloween. All week, we've been busily getting our costumes ready for the big day, and all month, it's been a time of mad brainstorming to figure out what we'll be.

After rejecting a whole bunch of potentially great ideas for various reasons — too hard to pull together, can't find the right accessories, etc. — we've settled on our costumes. But maybe in future years, one of us will be a Victorian-era safari explorer, the Statue of Liberty, Tron, Burt (from Burt's Bees), Domokun, or a garden gnome.

Adrian has decided to be a robot. For those who know Adrian, it's not hard to imagine him choosing to be a robot... he's surrounded by robot kitsch on a daily basis, he's constantly sketching robots, and occasionally his eyes light up red when he's processing information (well, OK, not really). But Adrian's not just being any robot: after finding some schematics online, he's been creating a giant robot suit from cardboard, masking tape, and pieces of duct foam, with movable, jointed fingers and all. It's going to be pretty awesome! Now he just has to figure out how to fit through doorways (and our narrow apartment hallway), hope the spray paint dries in time, and practice a dance to "Mr. Roboto". Here's a pic of the robot hands in progress:

As for me, since going to NYC this year, I was getting pretty excited to have an excuse to wear my foam Statue of Liberty crown and drape myself in green bedsheets. I was even practicing my regal poses, and dreaming up fun and politically incorrect variations. But then, the shiny red Lucha Libre mask (souvenir from Cancun) sitting on our stereo, next to the Statue crown caught my eye — what a great excuse to be a Mexican wrestler! So today I'll be at my sewing machine, stitching a shiny red cape, just like Nacho Libre did in his hilariously awesome movie. And tonight (for a house party) and tomorrow (for the annual Church St street party) I'll don a pair of shiny leggings, red wrestling boot covers and a mask, and flex my very non-wrestler-like muscles (haha). Big thanks to Forever 21 for deeming gold leggings 'in fashion' this season! I must also mention my excitement at finding red vinyl boot coverings that will be awesome wrestling boots: they were meant to be skanky thigh-high "devil" boots (according to the package photo), but changing the shoelaces to white and folding them down low transform them amazingly to wrestling boots! Hopefully I don't get invited into an actual wrestling match. -D.

Squirrel Chasing

2010-09-30T14:59:00.011+10:00

Where did September go? It was another speedy month, that's for sure. What we do know is that we love mild fall days like today... and couldn't resist taking a little time out to go squirrel watching in Trinity Bellwoods park. (The squirrels are so crazy in the fall!) Oh yeah, did I mention I'm madly in love with my new camera?

Squirrel fight!

The CNE

2010-09-02T12:58:00.018+10:00

Not long after we returned from Philadelphia, I spent an evening at the CNE with a couple of friends and my brand-new camera. With all the flashing, coloured lights, it's a photographer's dream. Here's a few pics from my evening adventure... - D.

Time to try some very-much-hyped deep fried butter. The lineup was an hour long! (But at least it wasn't nearly as gross as it sounded-- in fact, it was pretty yummy. Kind of like eating a warm, hollow Timbit with a tiny bit of butter melted in the centre.

Yes, We Really Did Go To The Jersey Shore (day 3)

2010-08-29T23:33:00.013+10:00

For our last day in Philly, we thought we'd likely have covered the sights by now and decided to book a rental car and head to the beach. After all, we rarely get to see the ocean anymore, and the New Jersey coast was just an hour away from the city! So we said a teary goodbye to our giant hotel room and our giant free buffet breakfast, and hit the road in a Zipcar (yes, it's true — our Zipcar membership works for U.S. and U.K. cities too! Amazing to not have to deal with all the usual rental-car hassles.)

We took our time meandering through New Jersey on the way to the beach, stopping in towns we liked the names of — like Egg Harbor and Pleasantville — and later got sidetracked with some pirate-themed minigolf just blocks from the beach when we finally made it to Ocean City. By the time we set foot on the boardwalk, the sky was clouding over and the wind had whipped up. Ah, well! We got our beach gear on anyway, strolled past the "frozen custard" stands and saltwater taffy shops, and staked our place in the sand at the surfing beach (the ocean was ice-cold so there was no chance of swimming anyhow). Not five minutes later the sky turned a shade of black and we found ourselves sunbathing in the rain...

But even in the rain, Ocean City was as adorable as our Lonely Planet had suggested. It was definitely a family resort town, but perhaps that made it all that more full of kitsch: carnie rides, minigolf courses, t-shirt shops and the like. The seaside promenade definitely had that old-timey, living-the-good-life-on-summer-holidays, blast-from-the-past kind of feel with its old buildings and wholesome fun (reminiscent of Brighton Beach in England, I thought). I half expected to see sunbathers in those full-length striped swimsuits frolicking around in the surf. It was definitely not the Jersey Shore everyone now thinks of, thanks to Snooki and "The Situation" and their gang of supertanned reality TV stars; from what I hear, THAT Jersey Shore was several towns north of us, in Seaside Heights. There were, however, many Jersey Shore references on t-shirts and souvenirs in Ocean City, which I totally had to get my TV-savvy sister to translate for me from my photos later on.

Our doomed travel time-management skills caught up with us again, and after some moseying around the century-old Shriver's taffy shop, unfortunately we didn't end up with much time left to explore Atlantic City. Someday I'd very much like to go back to Atlantic City though, fully taking in the flashy town that Monopoly (the game) was based on, a little fact we learned just days earlier. Apparently the streets in the board game are all named after Atlantic City streets, and from what we heard, over the years the real-life property values have remained pretty proportionate to the properties in the game. I managed to get some photos of places like Kentucky Ave. and Ventnor Ave., we cruised by the massive casinos, did a wee bit of outlet shopping, and had to dash back to Philadelphia to make our overnight bus. I never would have thought that three days in/around Philly wouldn't be enough, but I guess I was wrong... and now I'm sure we'll be taking a trip back there one day soon. (-D.)

At the old ball game (Philly, Part 2)

2010-08-27T14:49:00.006+10:00

On Sunday, the plan was to get up early, hit the famous Philadelphia Museum of Art, then head down to the Citizen's Bank Park for a Phillies game. Well, so much for planning. We made it to the museum withjust enough time to take a lot of silly pics of each other mimicking Rocky's famous run up the steps (c'mon, EVERYONE does it!), and sadly had to skip the art.

We made it to the south end of the city just in time for the start of the ball game. Was it ever a great scene! Unlike at a Blue Jays game, the day's attendance was over 40,000 and there was a real fan spirit in the endless sea of red shirts. We got into it as well, Adrian buying a Phillies cap and me a (ex-Jay) Roy Halliday Phillies t-shirt. The ballpark itself was very cool and had many levels, so we really only stayed in our nosebleed seats for three innings before we decided to go exploring, and didn't return for hours. What's great about the Phillies' ballpark is, if you don't mind standing at a railing, there's a great view from every angle and level. We snacked and drank our way around the park, trying soft pretzels, Budweisers in plastic pint-size bottles, nachos, Bud Light Lime in crazy-looking aluminum bottles, etc. And aside from the food and the views, it was actually a really good game, with several Phillies home runs and a great bunch of team-specific cheers — plus, what has to be the oddest mascot ever, The Phanatic (what kind of creature is it, exactly?). It was also a little jarring to have to listen to "God Bless America" during the seventh-inning stretch (rather than "OK, Blue Jays").

The sky was ominous and it eventually started raining hard enough to cause a rain delay... by this time we were hanging out at field level behind right field, and it was the 8th inning. While a lot of fans left sometime during the hour-long delay, we were loving it, as rain delays are non-existent during Jays games at the Rogers Centre! We met some quirky locals as we all huddled in the sheltered areas, and marveled at the amount of water on the field (as ballpark staff squished and plodded through it). After the rain ceased, it took nearly half an hour for the groundskeepers to squeegee the water off the field, and the Phillies managed to score a few more runs before the end of the game, when the giant neon-lit Liberty Bell above the outfield came alive and started ringing (love these ballpark quirks!).

And though the rain dried up for the rest of the game, we somehow got caught in another downpour between the field and the subway station, and found ourselves drenched all over again! We spent the evening wandering the area around South Street (a place one of our friends from the ballpark told us "is full of freaks and weirdos"), which wasn't all that full of weirdos on a Sunday night, but pleasantly full of kitschy shop signs, tattoo shops, and restaurants. By the end of the first two days we'd done so much walking we felt like we could draw a map of downtown Philly with eyes closed!

A Weekend in Philly! (Part 1)

2010-08-25T11:59:00.008+10:00

We weren't sure what to expect when we booked a weekend in Philadelphia. But the lure of free bus tickets proved to be too much and so, off we were to a new city! Back to our old ways of 'book first, plan later' (remember Hong Kong?).

It all began back in June, shortly after we'd returned from visiting New York City, and the travel bug had returned in full force. I was casually surfing travel sites when I learned Megabus — a budget bus company with routes around North America — was launching a Toronto-Philly route this summer, and was giving away 10,000 free rides between the cities. Amazing! Without a clue about what we might possibly do with a weekend in Philadelphia, I booked us a couple of tickets.

So armed with our backpacks and my brand-new Canon DSLR camera (my new amazing birthday present!), we made our way down to the bus terminal on Friday morning for our 10am departure. Unlike the bus to NYC, we were surprised to find barely anyone waiting to board — for the NYC routes, it's necessary to line up with elbows out to fight for a seat. We scored the the very front seats on the upper level of the double-decker Megabus, and off we went. The ride was long — it was supposed to be 10 hours, but a back-up at the border meant we didn't get into Philadelphia until almost 11pm. Were we ever ready to stretch our legs after that!

At first glance, downtown Philly was a combination of grand old buildings, glassy new skyscrapers, and sadly, a lot of homeless people. We found our hotel, the Embassy Suites, located along a grand Parisian-style boulevard lined with neoclassical buildings and a majestic fountain. Amazing! The hotel was a killer deal found online on Hotwire, where we booked a "mystery" 3-star hotel for $59 a night (the catch is, you find out where you're staying after paying for it). We are happy to say for that price, we got a room larger than our apartment, with two TVs, the biggest bed we've ever slept in, and free buffet breakfast at TGIFriday's as well! Not too shabby for a couple of budget travellers who aren't at all strangers to shared bathrooms with cold showers.

The next day we kicked off the day by gorging ourselves on the free buffet breakfast and set off to see Philly's many historical sights. Borrowing a walking tour from a Lonely Planet borrowed from the library, we set off toward the Old City. Turned out nothing in Philly's core was very far, and ambled along the Benjamin Franklin Parkway (aka. grand old Parisian-style boulevard) to Robert Indiana's famous LOVE sculpture (we'd seen a replica in NYC just two months earlier), majestic City Hall (apparently the largest municipal building in the US), and then to the area around Independence Hall to get our fill of early American history. And while we can really only take so much flag-waving patriotism, it was pretty fun to meet the many enthusiastic historians decked out in costumes, just dying for the chance to explain the musket or the fife to the web generation. Interesting, and GREAT photo ops for sure!

I gather since September 11, the admission process for some of the historical sights have changed. While most sights remain free (which is rad), they now limit the number of people [potential terrorists] in the building where the Constitution was signed, and at the Liberty Bell, by giving out timed tickets. We had a couple of hours to wander before our turn, and wandered the historical area, finding Ben Franklin (or at least some trace of him) at every corner: we checked out Ben's post office, his printing house, found his likeness painted on signs everywhere and his name on a bridge and a major road. If we were really gung-ho about Ben Franklin, we could have even had breakfast with him! But the free buffet won this time. (Plus, all this Ben fandom made us giggle, as our most recent encounter with Ben prior to Philly was on "Drunk History" — Google it if you must. :) But despite all the Ben-loving, Philly's Old City was beautiful, well-preserved, and extremely friendly to the camera — and we totally fell in love with Elfreth's Alley, a quaint little cobblestoned street that's been inhabited since the 1700's. By the time it was our turn to head back to Independence Hall, we were exhausted from the heat and kind of whizzed through the Liberty Bell building too. :S

Feeling full of history, it felt well-deserved to treat ourselves to a nice dinner. My friend Angie lived in Philly for a few years and recommended a few places — we decided to hunt down La Viola, an Italian restaurant where she said everything on the menu was great. Angie warned us ahead of time of one common Philly restaurant quirk — it was BYOB. Strange, especially for an Italian place. But apparently Philadelphia's liquor laws are still totally archaic and many excellent (and higher-end) restaurants don't have liquor licenses. It's a great way to save some cash from our end, and we had a delicious white-tablecloth, al fresco, fresh-pasta/seafood multi-course meal for under $50! Definitely a good spot to hit if you're heading to Philly. However, we were so full after that it took hours of walking to even entertain the thought of going out for a drink, so we kinda failed at finding Philadelphia's nightlife. We did, on the other hand, check out the scenery on nearly every street in the west part of the downtown...

Goodbye, pad thai?

2010-08-12T23:08:00.004+10:00

Last night we caught an amazing show on TV that really started us thinking. "The 100 Mile Challenge" follows six families living in B.C. who agree to eat only foods grown within a 100-mile radius of their homes for 100 days. Sound simple? Not exactly. The idea comes from a book written by James MacKinnon and Alisa Smith called The 100-Mile Diet: A Year of Local Eating, in which the authors began thinking about what was actually on their plates, and decided to see if they could survive (happily) solely on locally-cultivated food. The authors were successful in their mission, and many others who've followed in their footsteps have been as well, and so we began wondering if we could do so ourselves. Surely we must already eat many foods grown in Ontario, right?

Wrong.

After a look in the fridge, we found asparagus from Mexico, strawberries from California, and even our eggs were American. We started to think about our daily staples — rice would be out, our regular cereals, and more than likely our bread. (One of the biggest issues the families on the show had was sourcing wheat grown in their area — imagine craving BREAD!) A few of the other foods the families in the challenge would have to give up grudgingly included coffee, tea, sweets, and beer — in fact, one woman decided to drive around her locale searching for chicory root, which she'd heard was something of a substitute for coffee when roasted and steeped. What could we actually eat if we were to take on the challenge? We started doing a little research of our own.

A 100-mile radius around Toronto luckily takes in the bountiful Niagara region (hooray fruits and wine!) and from driving around Ontario, we do know there's plenty of farmland. Still, we definitely have a lot to learn when it comes to our local produce. In Toronto there are a number of weekly farmers' markets held in parks around the city, including nearby Trinity Bellwoods, Dufferin Grove, and Riverdale — so we might not starve entirely. But if we were to do it, would we run into the same troubles as the families on the TV show with sourcing wheat? Sadly, it would also be goodbye to pad thai, dumplings, mangoes, and all of the Asian staples we've so grown to love since travelling. And sourcing local food also seems to necessitate having a backyard garden, a car, and a lot of time (a few things we don't have).

Still, we applaud the people who are taking the 100 Mile Challenge, and will continue to mull over the idea with the hopes that one day we'll do it ourselves. We all should be supporting our local producers and reducing our carbon footprint by NOT importing our food thousands of kilometres if we can help it. At the very least, we'll try to buy more local food — and we can tell you from experience that the Niagara cherries we bought at the Cambridge farmers' market were far better than the ones purchased at the grocery store, just as one example. Take a look in your fridge and tell us what you find! Just a little... err... food for thought.

A few other resources:
Eat-local.ca : A Canadian site that eases the search for local food.
The 100 Mile Challenge : The 100 Mile Challenge TV show site.
The 100-Mile Diet: Authors Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon's site.
Localeating.ca : An online community helping Canadians eat locally.

Living car-free -- almost

2010-07-29T21:37:00.008+10:00

Summertime's the time of year when really we wish we owned a vehicle. Unfortunately, without a car, there are no breezy summer road trips, no camping weekends, and no beach days to be had — at least not without quite a bit of effort and cost.

Still, we both agree that as long as we live downtown, there's no real need for our own wheels. IKEA delivers if we ever need a new piece of furniture. The TTC can help us transport a large floor fan from Canadian Tire to the apartment. And all we really need to grocery shop is a bicycle and a backpack.

But since last week, we are car-less no more! Nope, we didn't give up our savings to buy ourselves a snazzy new hybrid (though that would be kind of cool). We joined Zipcar!

For those of you new to car-sharing, it's a great concept perfect for the many downtown-dwellers like us, who only want a car occasionally to run errands. Basically, you pay a membership fee to join the organization, then rent cars by the hour. The vehicles are based at various parking lots around the city, and it's a fully-automated system — so you make a reservation, show up with your Zipcard (a keycard which unlocks your car), and you're off. There's no paying for gas or insurance, and the scheduling system's incredibly flexible. There are two car-sharing companies in Toronto at the moment — Zipcar and Autoshare — and while there are pros and cons to both, when Zipcar posted a deal last week offering a year's membership for $35 (including $50 of bonus driving credit), it sold us!

Soon after we got the membership package in the mail, Dayle had to cart a large item from work to home. Normally, this would have been a job for a taxi, but it was also an excellent chance to try our first Zipcar. We booked it from 6:30-7:30pm, and figured we could run at least a few errands during our hour. Here's what happened:

6:30pm: Adrian goes to the designated parking lot to get the car. The car isn't there. He waits. He paces around the block. After waiting 10 minutes, Adrian calls Zipcar to complain. No answer from the helpline.

6:45pm: The car appears in the lot while Adrian is around the block. No sign of the inconsiderate driver, but at least we've got the car. Adrian zooms over to Dayle's workplace to pick her up.

6:55pm: Though we could have been dropping things off at our apartment by now, a little Craigslist hunting had found that there may be free furniture waiting curbside in a nearby neighbourhood... perhaps a desk chair! We take a small detour up Spadina. BIG mistake.

7:05pm: By this time, we've made it only a few blocks north on Spadina in the gridlocked traffic. Our first lesson: don't rent a Zipcar during rush hour... it's not zippy at all. Worse yet, we get stuck behind a French fry truck and get really hungry.

7:10pm: We abandon furniture plans and turn around at U of T. While looping down a skinny side street, we are suddenly blocked by someone pulling a ridiculous 16-point turn and bumping parked cars. Lesson #2: Lots of people in Toronto don't know how to drive. Yarrr!

7:15pm: We make it back to our apartment and unload the car in a frenzy. We debate whether there will be time to return the two boxes of empty beer bottles that are too annoying to walk over to the Beer Store with. Fearful of more traffic, we decline.

7:25pm: Adrian drops Dayle off and returns to the parking lot, greeted by a frantic woman who tells him he's late returning the vehicle (the clock says 7:29!) and she contacted Zipcar.

7:35pm: Adrian calls Zipcar again to defend himself against the woman's complaint (late fees are pricey). This time he reaches someone, and tells them we didn't get our car until 15 minutes after our scheduled time. The agent says, "No problem!" and credits Adrian an extra half hour ($4) for his troubles. We are happy drivers again!

The moral of the story: next time, reserve the car for more than an hour — our errand-running was just a bit too manic for our liking. We also won't drive right after office hours — though the cars are cheaper on weekdays (our Matrix was $8 for the hour, or $4 with our "discount" — hooray for customer service!). It was definitely fun to go cruising, though with hourly rates we still won't be road-trippers. At least we still have none of the responsibility or debts that come with being steady drivers. Can't wait 'til our next cruising date.

Emails From Beyond

2010-07-16T23:00:00.007+10:00

Yes, this was an actual email we received at work this week. Are the days of Nigerian money scams and bogus million-dollar lottery wins over? This one was pretty amazing... and I just had to share. Enjoy! D.

Subject: I PREDICTED ALL THAT HAPPENED IN LAST WORLD CUP

July 16, 2010 8:56:23 AM

From: "A German octopus" germanoctopus@samjdenny.net>

Attn sir,ma

I am well pleased when I got the attention the world during the last world cup in South Africa because I predicted the all the games correctly and also the final between Netherlands and Spain.
I want to use this medium to make open to every body around the world to come forward with his or her case a genuine prediction, concerning your contract, your inheritance, and your business including your part. Love partner and kinds of things which you want my prediction
then you come to me for prediction and direction.

FIFA president including the CAF president contacted me to stop further prediction on football matches because it will bring down the players moral and also the fans any time I predict on any competitive events.
contact me concerning your investiments,business I will help you to tell you what and where to go to conclude your business.

You can as well call me on my direct number + 447024056861

Best regards
A German octopus
I Paul is the world's first and only cephalopod psychic

World Cup Goodness

2010-07-12T10:00:00.007+10:00

Oh, how I love World Cup time in Toronto. I admit, it's not like I spend a great deal of time watching the games or anything; it's really the fan passion I love most. Any excuse for a street party — that's just how Toronto rolls (at least in the summer).

One thing we didn't think about when choosing an apartment nestled somewhere between Little Portugal and Little Italy, was how awesome our location would be during events like the World Cup. For the past month, there's been an excitement in the air: the constant din of honking and vuvuzelas, big cheers erupting from people's homes, and flags waving from nearly every car. That day Portugal beat North Korea 7-0, the honking started around 9am. I left for work a little after it began, and by the time I returned home that evening around 7, the parade of honking cars hadn't slowed down a bit. And that was just during the first round!

Sure, it's a little sad that Canada doesn't (will it ever?) have a World Cup-worthy team, but it's a great chance for Canadians to get in touch with our long-lost roots, or even just to claim some roots we have no real ties to — hey, we cheer for Mexico because it's a gorgeous country, OK?

And then there were all those quirky news stories. There was the couple that swam across a crocodile and hippo-infested river in a dare to get WC final game tickets. And how hilarious was Paul, the psychic German octopus, who kept predicting the winning teams? Amazing! The only thing I am sad about is that I actually didn't watch many games... next time I'll get into it, promise!

Here are some photos I snapped on College Street, just following Spain's win. It was great to see so much joy on the street (and on top of the streetcars)! -D.

Right after Spain's win.

Pure joy!

Taking back College Street.

Partying on top of the streetcars at College & Bathurst.

So many flags.

Almost an hour and a half after the final goal, and the crowds just kept growing.

Farewell to our dear friend, the vuvuzela.

Pure Michigan

2010-06-28T12:01:00.012+10:00

This past weekend's jaunt to Dayle's family's boat in Michigan came with a hefty dose of Americana. A few years ago, her family traded in their last Canadian powerboat (after scoring a great deal on a snazzier boat down south) and said goodbye to Georgian Bay after years of boating up north. Gone are the days of anchoring overnight in serene, rocky bays; the Group-of-Seven landscapes, tiny northern towns (with a severe lack of decent restaurants, to Dayle's mom's dismay) and swarms of sunset mosquitoes were a thing of the past. Boating south of the border — actually just across the St. Clair River from Canada — comes with a new type of adventure, more of the....er, cultural kind. Small-town America tends to surprise and thrill in little ways: the joy is in the details. It begins with Jobbie Nooner....

We were at the border crossing sometime after midnight on Thursday night, and with only two lanes open, it was very slow. Great, we've gotten the border guard who asks too many questions, we thought. When it was finally our turn, we were met with the usual "Where are you going?" and "For how long?" and Dayle's dad tells the guard about their boat in Algonac, Michigan, where they visit every weekend. "Ah. You heading to Jobbie Nooner tomorrow?" the guard says with a grin, and waves us through. Jobbie WHAT?? Dayle's parents have a good laugh and explain that Jobbie Nooner is a Michigan tradition, an informal annual holiday invented by auto workers ("jobbies") in the 1980s, who decided to knock off work at noon on a designated Friday and head to Gull Island, in the north part of Lake St. Clair, and get drinking. The tradition caught on and gets bigger and bigger every year, with more drinking and debauchery (ie. plenty of Mardi-Gras-style boob-baring for beads). It's been known to break up marriages and get people arrested, but depending who you talk to, it's one awesome/awful time. Even Kid Rock played an impromptu concert there last year, from a barge. It's 'Pure Michigan', apparently.

Friday morning was beautiful, hot and sunny, but there would be no Jobbie Nooner for us (not really our crowd?). We kicked off the day with a big, bargain American breakfast in one of Algonac's many tiny breakfast diners — something Dayle's parents were really growing to love. Two eggs, bacon, potatoes, toast, and coffee for $3? Yup, and for that price, you get way more food than humanly possible to eat. Charming touches at the diner included many "American" food choices, including "American cheese" (processed orange cheese?), and "American potatoes" (basically hash browns cut up in slices instead of grated). We also enjoyed the duck and deer paintings, the NRA sticker on the front door, and the waitress who told us we say "thank you" too much! But after leaving the wood-paneled diner, we headed out into the hot sun for a lovely afternoon of anchoring out in the lake, swimming, sunbathing (and burning!). Good fun... but as we were all dying of curiosity about Jobbie Nooner, we managed to do a bit of a cruise-by on the way back to port. From our distance (out of vomiting range), we didn't manage to catch much Mardi Gras action, but it was definitely a sight to behold: thousands of boats (more than 4000, said the news later on) anchored around the island, many tied to each other, full of party decorations, pirate flags, beer-drinking, and people. We turned on the radio to the coast guard station and were entertained for quite a while by calls from inebriated "Jobbies" who were reporting fights, border guards getting punched out, all that kind of stuff....

After all that hot sun, the next day we found ourselves craving another American tradition: ice cream. Dairy Queen wasn't far from the marina, but we decided to do as the locals do and drive a few blocks for ice cream. Of course, our "small" Blizzards were impossibly huge to eat, but it seemed appropriate to pig out in the riverbank park, under the shade of some trees by a cute old white clapboard house/local history museum, located between a huge flapping American flag and a war memorial. And we really couldn't resist a cruise through town, taking in excellently-named sights like the Fifth Third Bank, The Shop The Shop, and St. Clair Flats Taxidermy. Unfortunately the taxidermy shop was closed, but we managed to peer in the windows at the walls covered in deer heads, snarling boars, toothy possums, and a group of squirrels playing cards. we even met an old guy waiting in his car in the parking lot to get his ducks "fixed". He had Florida plates on his car, and an interesting sticker on the window showing a green skull and some writing — Adrian asked him about his "interesting sticker" and the man explained to us that he's part of a "Special Ops unit of former soldiers", who go on secret missions or something. Only in America! There are just so opportunities to feel like you're in a Michael Moore movie when you cross the border.

After a beer run/short exploration of the local grocery store (beer is SO cheap in the States!), we realized we'd never seen so many kinds of Pop Tarts in our lives, especially in one aisle (seriously, three shelves??). And not that cotton candy, fireworks, chocolate milk by the gallon, or alien-shaped cereal were on our shopping list.... but if they were, it's good to know we could find them at the grocery store!

But two full days of in-your-face Americana couldn't have prepared ourselves for Saturday evening. After a meat-filled dinner at Outback Steakhouse (but to our delight, Aussie beer like Boag's and Cooper's!!), we met Dayle's parents' boat friends in a roadhouse along the highway. The bar wasn't exactly one any of them would normally frequent, but the Lighthouse Tavern was owned by Diane's sister and well, it was Saturday night. When we pulled into the parking lot around the back of the bar, "Bad to the Bone" must have popped into all of our heads, as well as that scene in Terminator 2 when Arnold walked into the biker bar demanding some clothes, boots, and a motorcycle. It was that kind of place. We walked in slowly and found our friends at a long table in the dimly-lit bar, all looking a little timid. And then we learned it was karaoke night, much to Adrian's delight. He grabbed the thick book of songs from some redneck types at the next table, and made his picks as we all watched other patrons croon country songs next to Cyndi, the emcee with a seriously badass long blonde mullet. There was just so much to gape at: guys in leather vests with devil heads and something like "Hell to Pay" embroidered across the back (Hells Angels maybe???) and confederate-flag bandannas, an old cowboy sitting at the bar in a Stetson and a t-shirt reading 'Boot Hill Saloon' on the back, a polo-shirted jock type who sang some bad 80s song, a raspy guy named "Smokin' Joe" who growled songs onstage like "Turn the Page" (and wore a hilarious t-shirt reading 'On board, Off board, All Aboard, Never Bored"), and lots of bad high-waisted jeans and big hair on the ladies. It was pretty much a scene from a movie. Luckily, Adrian's songs got some good fan appreciation and we were allowed to stay (OK, it really wasn't like that — it was a pretty laid-back place!), but when we finally left out the back door to the bar and found the biker-types outside, we certainly weren't expecting the prim and proper "Good night, ladies" that we got.

And on Sunday morning, we couldn't leave the country without one more gargantuan breakfast feast for the road — and Adrian made sure to help stop terrorism by peeing on Osama bin Laden (we're not joking! The men's room urinals at the diner had Osama's likeness on the urinal mat, which read "Help Fight Terrorism: Support Operation Enduring Freedom") So, what can we say really? Americana...bring it on! Much as we like to poke fun at our gun-toting, flag-waving, highly carnivorous neighbours, they really do know how to have a good time. We're kinda sad we didn't score any Uncle Sam postcards, but well, there's always next time.

Artcrime!

2010-06-23T14:54:00.003+10:00

Artcrime!
Originally uploaded by bigquestionmarks.

We're not really sure when we first noticed the Sunday-afternoon gatherings happening outside our apartment building. But what we do know, is our door to the fire escape gives us a perfect view of the mysterious little weekly event.

At first, we thought perhaps it was a garage sale — strange though, since it only looked like paintings and chairs were for sale, with a few interested buyers milling about. Another week, we decided the garage sale — which was only oddball semi-abstract paintings, and no shoppers — must just have been an artist who was drying his freshly painted canvases. And then, another Sunday happened upon us, and we snapped this sneaky photo from our kitchen, and we figured it had to be some sort of group called Artcrime, conducting weekly meetings at the end of the driveway (hence the sign!). The only constants were the paintings, the location, and what looked like an old bleached-blond punk guy, a Billy Idol type. We were puzzled.

Adrian once went by to say hello — but didn't learn much other than our Billy Idol was pretty friendly and had some sort of European accent. In fact, it probably would have been easier to just head down the fire escape stairs and inquire what all the hubbub was about. But when it comes to apartment neighbours, it's always more fun to hypothesize about what's going on than to find out the truth.

In fact, it was total coincidence we were discussing our mysterious neighbour just this morning — and only a few hours later, Adrian was flipping through Saturday's Toronto Star Entertainment section (found on our front porch), and who's on page E14? Well, what do you know? It was our neighbour, pictured in all of his Steampunk-ish glory, in front of those very-familiar paintings and the Artcrime sign!

You'll have to read the story — tres bizarre — but in a nutshell, it turns out he's a pretty established "arts performer-provocateur" named Istvan Kantor (and many other names). He was born in Hungary and has been in Toronto for a few decades, where he has been banned from museums like the AGO (for his over-the-top, controversial, and bloody performance art) but has still managed to receive prestigious awards like the 2004 Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts. Our neighbourhood becomes ever more intriguing...

The Star's story: http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/article/823782--goddard-a-portrait-of-the-artist-as-provocateur

The artist's own page: http://www.ccca.ca/performance_artists/k/kantor/kantor_perf18/index.html

CTV's story on Kantor winning the Governor General's award: http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1078941406505_9?s_name=&no_ads=

Being Tourists...at home

2010-06-01T13:33:00.003+10:00

Last weekend we got to revisit something we're pretty good at but haven't done in ages: be tourists. And in our own town, no less. We'd been looking forward to a visit from our friends Megan & Justin for ages — and suddenly there they were, collapsed on our front porch with their backpacks, after 20 or so hours of airport-hopping and flying from Melbourne. We were their first stop on a four-week whirl of cities around North America.

In the weeks leading up to their visit, we'd been trying to brainstorm what was cool about Toronto (Ontario, even), but I guess when you've lived in a place for ages, the tourist attractions all seem cheesy, and your own city can definitely seem a bit dull ("Yeah, one day I should go up the CN Tower..." is a familiar refrain). But maybe we all just need some out-of-town friends to visit once in a while, to shed our snobbery and our "I'll do it someday" attitudes for a bit and to see things in a new way.

And that's what we did. On M & J's first night in, we finally got around to having dinner at Fresh, a great little veggie establishment on our street (where we hadn't yet eaten in the 8 months we've been on Crawford Street), and it was delicious. The next day we embarked on a little road trip... all the way to Niagara Falls! We tried to warn our friends how cheesy the town was, since that was what truly stuck out in our memories — I don't think any of us were actually prepared for how terrible it actually was — and rediscovered that the falls themselves are pretty impressive, despite the countless waterfalls we'd visited across Australia and Asia over the past few years. I guess all the fuss about Niagara is sort of justified — though I don't know about it being the "honeymoon capital"! After ooh-ing and aah-ing at the falls for a while, we did the usual obligatory walk up Clifton Hill, and promptly forgot about the stunning waterfall behind us. Giant rooftop burger-eating Frankenstein, roaming Reese Peanut Butter Cup and Spongebob mascots, and haunted houses galore will do that to you. It wasn't long before we decided to flee the circus on the hill for another few years. That night we headed to Toronto staple Sneaky Dee's to watch some bands and drink beer (definitely a main attraction, in our opinions!). But by then, we realized our friends still hadn't seen anything of Toronto.

Sunday morning — er, afternoon, thanks jetlag! — we moseyed down to Kensington Market for the lively Pedestrian Sundays fest which happens every week in the summer. Browsing vintage shops and watching street performers: that's more the Toronto we love. It was a scorcher of a day — bit of a shock to Megan and Justin, who in Melbourne were getting into winter about now — but easily fixed with a giant, tooth-dissolving frozen Slurpee from 7-11. (One thing you don't notice when you've lived in North America most of your life is the massive food portions everywhere. It was kind of fun watching our friends' eyes bug out at the serving sizes! Though we did keep telling them: just you wait 'til you get to the States!)

We spent the rest of Sunday meandering the streets of Toronto, and came to the realization that, in downtown Toronto, everything is just "a little bit further". We're in Chinatown — hey, let's check out Queen Street! Just a bit further south. And hey — there's the Skydome! Well, it's only a few blocks that way. I guess we could have kept walking for days in this manner...

On Monday, Justin & Megan's last day in Toronto, we decided to meander a little bit less and instead, hit some prime destinations. Mission #1: Find those two crazy kids a pancake-and-maple-syrup breakfast! Not the easiest thing to find for vegans, but we totally lucked out. Having read about a place called Sadie's Diner, we eventually found it at Adelaide and Portland Streets, and all had the most amazing and animal-friendly breakfast feast (I think we're all still dreaming about it). Even Adrian begrudgingly loved his fake bacon and sausage! Lesson #1 for us: Toronto is a pretty awesome place for vegans and vegetarians to hang out (though now maybe not as much, since M&J bought the city's entire stock of soy ice cream).

Mission #2: Do the most touristy thing possible in Toronto — ascend the CN Tower. I was surprised to learn Adrian had never been up the tower in his entire life; I myself had avoided the place since the first time I went up at 5 years old and a very confusing space 'game' at the base of the tower printed off a ticket for me with my "alien name" and a fictitious space-age health condition- "Martian Dropsy". I've grown spots in fear every time I near the tower since then. But this time, no dropsy for anyone (phew) and it was fun! Though I still don't think Toronto is anything that special to look at from above. Lesson #2: The glass floor in the CN Tower gives even the bravest of us vertigo after enough jumping around on it.

Mission #3: Take in the all-American sport of baseball... in Canada. Yes, we hit a Jays game — M&J spoiled us with some great tickets and it was great beer- and heckler-filled fun for nine innings vs. Tampa Bay! (And poor old Carl Crawford — still getting heckled at the Dome) Lesson #3: Some of us were born to heckle, some born to be heckled. Sorry, Crawford.

Anyway, the moral of our long-winded tale is that being a tourist is always fun — but sometimes you just need the right people around to put on those knee-high socks and sandals with. Stay tuned for part 2 of our tourist adventures- our weekend in NYC with Megan & Justin...

The Great Postcard Hunt

2010-05-15T15:16:00.002+10:00

Over the past few months, we've been doing our best to catch up on mail correspondence to our friends scattered abroad. While we were traveling, we mailed a lot of postcards from exotic places to people back home, and even to people we met along the way. It was fun to find some pretty postcards, spend an afternoon in a cafe on on the beach writing a few lines about our adventures, affix a cool postage stamp (after the usual intense hunt for stamps!), and finally send them away. Sometimes, when we were living in the same place for long enough, people would send us letters, postcards, and photos. It was awesome. So naturally, we want to keep that up.

I won't go into my usual rant about how sad I am that personal messages to one other keep getting shorter and shorter — though over the course of a few years we have watched correspondence shrink from letters handwritten on paper to emails, to Facebook posts, to text messages, and now to 140-character posts on Twitter and Blackberry one-liners — but Adrian and I both do feel strongly about keeping alive the traditions of physically writing a letter and dropping it in the post. Why? Maybe we're a bit old-school. But think of the last time you received a hand-written letter in the mail. Wasn't it a great feeling? And if you think about it, isn't is worth the 57 cents, or even the $1.70 in postage to totally make someone's day?

So naturally, I was thrilled when I stumbled upon a project this week that not only shared my views, but had facilitated a worldwide network of postcard swapping! It's called Postcrossing, and was organized in 2004 back by a Portuguese student who, just like so many of us, loved to receive real mail. Since then, more than 4 million postcards have been swapped worldwide with the help of the website. The idea is, you send a postcard to an address randomly given to you by Postcrossing; the receiver registers it online once it arrives; after that, your address goes into the bank for someone to write you one. Hence turning your mailbox "into a box of surprises", as the web site puts it. So with my first assignment to write a quick postcard to Belarus, we'll see what happens.

However, we've learned finding a cool/pretty/interesting Toronto postcard is no easy task. Since our return, we've been keeping our eyes open for interesting ones to send abroad... without a whole lot of luck. Surely there must be something more interesting around here than the CN Tower, Chinatown, and Niagara Falls! (In fact, we found one eerie postcard combining a badly Photoshopped Lake Ontario scene and Niagara Falls, where it looks like the lake is draining INTO the falls! Very apocalyptic.) I'm half ready to start making my own. I recall only ever having this problem in a tiny town in Burma (Pyin U Lwin), a place filled with ornate horse carriages and not a single postcard depicting any of the town's quaint charm! (I actually suggested to a keen market merchant to start making his own.)
Funny we'd have the same problem in Toronto... how about postcards of the albino squirrels, the hippies of Kensington market, the old houses, the flashing lights of Honest Ed's, that flatiron building on Front Street, or even Toronto Island? Perhaps the old graveyard in Cabbagetown, High Park, the subway stations, the Italian churches in our neighbourhood? If anyone has any suggestions of (a) where to find awesome postcards in Toronto; or (b) what we should use as subject matter once we're fed up enough to start making our own, let us know! For now, we'll leave you with a page of gorgeous Toronto postcards from years ago... at least we had urban charm, once upon a time. (Nowadays it just appears we have a lot of fireworks.)

... not the most exciting finds so far! (-d.)

Ack! Giant bugs!

2010-04-16T23:17:00.004+10:00

This morning, I came out of the bathroom and there was something unfamiliar (and big) high on the bedroom wall. I must back up and note here that after spending two years in Australia, I've adopted an odd habit of glancing up at ceiling corners when I enter a room; it's something I haven't managed to shake since our return to Canada, and it probably weirds some people out when we're in mid-conversation and my gaze suddenly shoots to the top corners of the room-- it's just a reflex from our many encounters with the scary giant Huntsman spiders we encountered now and then. I now can't help myself from examining every crack and dent carefully-- but it's made me an excellent gecko spotter, I'll add.

So naturally this morning, my eyes are instantly drawn to a large dark shadow on the otherwise plain white wall. I get closer and my fears are confirmed: a GIANT BUG. A silverfish, I think, but one of epic size. (Just check out this photo of Adrian and the bug to get an idea of its size!) Not sure what it was doing in our apartment, but I hope it was the only one! Shriek.... in comes Adrian the super bug killer... even he is a little in awe of the size of this Canadian apartment bug and its billions of legs. Luckily, unlike the Huntsman, it doesn't go running at my shrieks (little discovery: silverfish have crappy hearing). A swat of a rolled-up newspaper solves the problem... phew! Its legs go on twitching for quite a while before we flush it. Gross. And now, thanks to this horrible beginning to my Friday, I'll be checking every spot on the wall even more diligently! (And I advise you to do the same.) Ew! -D.

Forever Learning

2010-04-12T09:17:00.004+10:00

Hooray for spring! Perhaps there's something about the energy in the air and the new growth on the trees that has inspired us to add a few new activities to our weekly routines. Yoga's one of them: we recently enrolled in a weekly class, held just down the block at the community centre. We didn't know what to expect really — I'd taken a group class once before at Ryerson, and Adrian was familiar with yoga only through Rodney Yee, a long-haired television guru who used to lead us through a dawn routine, clad in a Speedo on a Hawaiian beach — that is, when we had enough space in our living room to flail around in front of the DVD player. But so far, so good. Our class consists of about 9 or 10 participants, mostly grey-haired, so there is lots of joint-cracking and not much self-consciousness about it (my noisy knees blend right in!). Our teacher likes to talk about the "bandhas", which we still don't totally understand — something to do with regulating energy in the body. We kind of thought she was making them up, but it turns out there's lot online about these mysterious bandhas. The yoga I learned before was more about "cat pose" and "mountain pose", which seemed a little more fun and cute. This new teacher's all business though, getting us to stretch all kinds of weird body parts to a soundtrack of CDs of new-agey music. And I must admit, last class when she mentioned something about the sphincter I nearly lost it. It's definitely an experience!

Another new thing I've taken up is literacy tutoring: basically, teaching English grammar, reading, writing, that sort of thing to an adult whose English skills aren't up to par with the rest of us. I was surprised to learn that there are actually many Canadian-born adults who are functioning in society but without the basic skills to read, spell, or craft a complete sentence. I thought since someday I may want to teach English somewhere overseas, it might not be a bad thing to try — first off, to see if I enjoy teaching, and secondly, to get some good teaching experience for the resume. It was a New Year's resolution of mine to start doing a bit of volunteer work, and after some hunting, I found this opportunity through a posting on the excellent Volunteer Toronto website. It's not a huge time commitment (two hours a week) and our sessions are organized through and held at the library/community centre a few blocks from our place, so it suits me well. At first, I was hoping to tutor an ESL (English as a Second Language) student, but the opportunity came along to be paired up with "a more advanced learner", so I thought I'd give it a go. My 'learner' (let's call her Natasha) is a Toronto native who is actually a year or two older than me, and is looking to go to university after a few rocky stints with college, and from what I gather, some health problems relating to a head injury have caused her to have trouble remembering and focusing. So sometimes Natasha is motivated to learn, and other times she's discouraged and kind of distracted. It's definitely a challenge to figure out how to convey the information in a way that's interesting and makes sense — while often re-learning the technical stuff myself behind things I realize I take for granted, like how to craft a complete sentence (** it needs a subject and a verb... definitely something I couldn't have explained to someone else before this!)! And as someone who likes a good to-do list and a plan, in the beginning, I found it a bit tough to adjust to and just accept our forever-changing focus at our sessions.

For the first few weeks, we went through some basic grammar rules; another week we jumped to brainstorming an entrance letter to York's kinesiology program; and for the last two weeks we've been going through the basics of how to write an essay. The amazing thing I've found with tutoring is that I'm learning just as much as Natasha is. It's also cool to realize how much information is stuffed at the back corners of the brain: though I haven't written an essay in years, as we talked about essay writing, suddenly so much stored knowledge about formatting, etc., just came rushing back. I'm happy to say that this week, I feel we had a real breakthrough — believe it or not, because we wrote a mini essay on Madonna (inspired by a concert that was playing on TV the night previous)! After an utterly discouraging session the week before, where Natasha confessed to me at the end how hard she found it to understand what I was teaching, this week she said "You know, I think I really get how to write the essay outline now — thanks for that." A great feeling after stumbling my way through the beginnings of this whole tutoring thing. And so I guess lesson one is that pop culture truly is a great bridge between people!

Sadly, I've come to the conclusion once again (my copy editing teacher at Ryerson brought this to light) that the Ontario school system was severely lacking in teaching us the basics of grammar, at least when I went through the system. I wish they would have spent some time teaching us what a conjunction, noun, preposition, and all of those nuts and bolts, were, rather than it being an afterthought after learning Shakespeare for months on end (Natasha feels the same). I know our parents' generation had all this stuff ingrained in their heads, and it's too bad we weren't as lucky (though I'm sure we would have growled about it at the time). I guess we're doomed to be a generation of people with poor sentence structure... though I'll bet at least we can spell better than the MSN/text-message generations following us!

Anyway, if anyone's feeling extra nerdy about learning some grammar, I can suggest a few good books for you: Eats Shoots and Leaves by Lynne Truss is a funny one from a self-professed "stickler". There's the classic The Elements of Style by William Strunk Jr. and E.B. White, which gets referenced a lot by writers/journalists but I'm a little embarrassed to say I still have yet to fully read it (we had so much to do in J-school!). I have another one on my shelf called Woe Is I, by Patricia T. O'Conner, which is a lighthearted grammar guide with a timely and appropriate chapter on email grammar, among other topics. And then there's Bill Bryson's Mother Tongue, a great historical (and humourous) book about the English language, which I read while I was traveling and made me constantly realize my English had become quite "pidgin" while in Southeast Asia. And wow, just found an adorable grammar game! Enjoy. - D.

The St. Patrick's Day Massacre

2010-03-29T03:51:00.011+11:00

There was no green beer to be had on St. Patrick's Day as we strolled into the emergency room at Toronto Western Hospital. The area itself is prone to 'interesting cases' to begin with, but we knew that going in - and I suppose we were early enough to avoid the Paddy's Day revelers.

I had put a nice half inch gash into my middle finger or "digitus medius" just under the collateral ligament of the 2nd phalanx. After the head, it's the fingers (or phanagis) that bleed the most, this is because there is an web of interconnecting veins that run through your hand called the dorsal metacarpal arteries.

Luckily for us my health care had kicked back in sometime in February, the odd thing is that after all those years travelling and paying for health insurance, it's now that I need to cash in on it (but for free). All that wasted cash - but better safe than sorry.

Checking in with the nurse, we'd glanced at the clock; check-in time 9pm.
In the waiting room there were a few odds and ends. An old lady who wore her sunglasses (at night), a roving alcoholic who was trying to check himself into rehab, and a little moaning Chinese girl with her parents.

It's great for comic situations or when you want to 'show' your boss your new injury, but soon turns equally embarrassing when you have to explain that while washing dishes the coffee cup that was in your hand suddenly transformed from a nice mug into a thousand shards of razor sharp blades. I'll never wash dishes again, I have a great excuse.

But after a few hours of waiting around, a quick look from the doctor, and an x-ray, everything came back okay, and I was superglued nicely. No stitches. Unless the cut is deep enough they just glue you up and send you on your way.

Other notable stories from the ER include: a man that had cut himself badly with some garden shears 12 hours earlier in the day - (they couldn't do anything because he'd left it so late), a kid with meningitis whose father wouldn't let the doctors test for it - (he was unsure about the side-effects of such a procedure, but seemed to miss the part where they mentioned his son might die from meningitis), and 2 suicide cases.

After I was discharged at 1:45am there was hardly time to seek out a green beer. I'd had my fill of tetanus boosters and Tim Horton's coffee.
On the up-side of everything - it's great to live 15 minutes walking distance from the hospital - and I'll be sure to leave the dishes until after the next big holiday.

Just Checking the Royal Emails...

2010-03-14T14:32:00.012+11:00

It's not every day one gets an email from royalty. What started as a simple, quiet Saturday evening just became about 1000 times more interesting, and took us back down memory lane....

Our story takes us way back to our days on the road with Daisy, a little over a year ago now. We had been camping for a few days in stunning Cape Range National Park, a little piece of outback paradise set next to the beautiful blue-green waters of the Ningaloo Reef. It had been an eventful couple of days: drift-snorkeling the coral reef right off the shore of Turquoise Bay under the searing outback sun; veering around a lone brumby (wild horse) on the highway; shooing a six-foot snake that was trying to sneak into our van; eating dinner under a spooky pink globe of a sun (we learned later it was pink from the smoke of a massive bushfire burning up a cattle station a short way down the coast); finding our campsite taken over by giant scary crabs that would skitter around our van when the evening darkness set in. After seeing nearly the whole country and experiencing all the surrealness of Cape Range, we figured there couldn't be that many thrills left for us on the road.

So when we learned from some fellow travelers of a tiny sovereign nation housed within the borders of Australia, just a few hundred kilometres south of us, we had to know more! We questioned locals, who would laugh a bit, shake their heads, and confirm that yes, the Principality of Hutt River (formerly Hutt River Province), does indeed exist. Strangely enough, Hutt River (about the size of Hong Kong Island) was marked on some of our maps, but not on others. But the more we learned about the Prinicipality's history, the more intrigued we were: in a nutshell, in the late 1960s, the Australian government imposed wheat production quotas seen as ridiculous by a farmer named Leonard. He fought back, and found a pretty awesome loophole in the Constitution which allowed him to declare independence from Australia in 1970 with his piece of land. Eventually he took on the title of Prince Leonard (not King, as "kings speak to God" was his reasoning), and with his wife, Princess Shirley and the rest of the royal family, has been quietly irritating the Aussie government for decades. So of course we had to pay a visit!

After spending a few nights in the cute beach town of Kalbarri, we packed up Daisy and headed inland off the main highway. A few back roads later, we reached a sign: WELCOME TO THE PRINCIPALITY OF HUTT RIVER. We pulled into the driveway and there was no palace or moat: it looked like a your ordinary farm. Should we have called ahead? We had a bit of a wander around the dusty grounds (to our relief, at least there were signs welcoming in visitors) and eventually we were greeted by an elderly but lively man: His Royal Highness Prince Leonard himself! The Prince gave us the grand tour — though we figured by now he'd be sick of doing so — and he explained the whole secession story in detail, down to the law which allowed it, his special non-tax-paying arrangements with the Australian Tax Office (thanks to friends in high places), and his free trade agreement with Australia. We were awed at the fact that anyone — let alone a wheat farmer with a lot of land to tend to — would read legal documents and the national constitution for fun. But then, there probably isn't a lot to do out there. We were pretty impressed by the plucky HRH Prince Leonard's intelligence. We oohed and aahed at the royal gifts received from around the world, the photographs, and the spirit with which Prince Leonard carried himself. You could tell that, even after 39 years, he was still grinning at his big win!

The Prince later took us into the post office (yes, Hutt River has its own stamps and postal service — in fact, apparently in 1976, when Australia Post refused to handle the nation's mail, it was re-routed through Canada) and stamped our passports. We bought some postcards and even some Hutt River currency (awesome!). In the end, Adrian couldn't resist the notion of earning an official title in the kingdom — nor Prince Leonard's sales pitch — and became an Officer in the Illustrious Order of Merit (he keeps forgetting to add the O.I.O.M after his name on cheques!). We just couldn't resist contributing to the guy who's been sticking it to the Aussie government for the past 39 years!

Eventually, we shook hands with the prince again (the princess wasn't around that day) and he left us to explore the other royal buildings — including a chapel with some extremely frightening religious art to go with the royal portraits. We later mailed Adrian's O.I.O.M. pin home and have been waiting for the accompanying certificate to arrive from Hutt River since then. This week Adrian finally remembered to make contact about the missing certificate, and expecting a response from the kingdom's scribe or something, opens an email tonight from Prince Leonard himself — letting him know the Principality will reissue the missing papers. Long live the prince, we do say!

And with all that said, even though we couldn't have spent more than an hour or two within its border, the Principality of Hutt River remains close to our hearts. Whenever someone flips through our passports reading, "Thailand, Hong Kong, Taipei, Brisbane — Hutt River?? Where is that??" We can only laugh and tell our strange story. If anyone's planning to be near Perth next month, take note: Hutt River's 40th anniversary of independence is coming soon. Surely a good party! Mark April 21st on your calendars — we'll bring the fireworks.

A Caffeinated Free-for-all

2010-03-06T20:13:00.000+11:00

Last night, we had a silly idea. Prompted by the hype about the free coffee war which started brewing this month — McDonald's vs. Timmy's vs. Country Style*, etc. — we thought, why not spend our Saturday hopping about town, drinking a smorgasbord of coffees for free? We certainly love our coffee, and we love free things even more! What better way to enjoy the Saturday sunshine, really?

First stop was Second Cup. A few weeks ago, a flyer appeared in our mailbox that read "Get a Second Cup on us, 11 times." After reading a bit further, it appeared we'd received a buy-one-get-one-free coffee card for Second Cup (with the first coffee being free!). Without knowing anything of McDonald's free coffee scheme or the beginning of Tim Horton's Roll Up the Rim contest at the time, we'd put the flyer aside for later.

So, a little after breakfast (and the usual cup or two of our Maxwell House brew at home), we strolled into the Second Cup at the corner of King & Strachan Streets, in the heart of condoville. Since we only had one free cup to take, Adrian went for it and Dayle went for a chai latte (yum! which month do those go free?). Points to Second Cup for its comfy chairs, peaceful dining-room-style decor (earth tones and money trees), and good atmosphere for thinking and chatting. Drawbacks: Adrian found it a little hard to speak quietly enough as to not disrupt the peace, and Dayle burnt her tongue on the scorching-hot drinks. The jazz soundtrack wasn't really our thing either, but the general experience gets our thumbs up. Lastly, the paradiso blend coffee was good, but a wee bit strong. The only worry is that we set the bar too high for the coffee sampling to come...
Cost: $4.10 (for the chai latte)

Next on the list was McDonald's, who are offering free coffee all day, every day, from March 1-14. Now that's a lot of free coffee! We wandered the longest way possible up to Dundas and Bathurst, to try and process some of the caffeine and soak up some more sunshine.

As soon as we entered the restaurant, we found that the free coffee offer was no secret. The lineup to the counter nearly reached the door, and the coffee was flowing. After some scrambling to find a seat, we realized how spoiled we had been in the cushy Second Cup chairs-- here, it was all of that hard institutional seating that makes a trip to McD's a short one, helped along by the lite-rock soundtrack of Corey Hart and company (but luckily it was loud enough in there that Adrian had no qualms about singing along loudly). Tastewise, the McDonald's arabica coffee was decent, though perhaps we weren't at the top of our tasting game having burnt off our tastebuds in Second Cup--we had a giggle at the "Caution: HOT!" warnings on the cups of warm coffee. It's still uncertain if we'd go purposely to McDonald's for coffee if it wasn't free-- though we'll award points for the stellar people-watching at Dundas & Spadina (plus the added theatrical value of having three crazy people inside the restaurant). Unfortunately though, our visit didn't come totally free-- we couldn't help but be tempted by the fries. Ronald wins again!
Cost: $5.69 (free coffee, but no free fries!)

Next stop: good old Canuck staple Timmy's. Dayle had won a free coffee after getting a Roll Up The Rim winner this past week-- what luck! Although there was a Tim Horton's across the street from McDonald's, we thought we'd shed some coffee jitters with a lightning-speed walk through Chinatown to the next closest Timmy's (slow down, Adrian!).

However, even after a good long wander through Dragon City shopping mall, a lengthy grocery shop, and more meandering, we arrived at Tim Horton's and stopped in front. Lesson of the day: there is indeed a such thing as too much free coffee, our stomachs had taken their limit (and Adrian had begun to see through space and time). Our Roll Up The Rim winnings would just have to wait... but maybe we'll try our free coffee tour again next week!

Today's free coffee count: 3
Total $ spent ordering other things while getting sick of coffee: $9.79

*Country Style's giving coffee away on Wednesdays.

Getting Cultured...

2010-02-12T12:26:00.007+11:00

Hola! It's been a while since the last update. How time flies in Cancun....

Today we escaped the hustle and bustle of the hotel strip to get a little Mayan culture: a tour of the ancient Mayan city of Chichen Itza. My dad and I both being into ancient history, we really enjoyed it. Chichen Itza is located in Yucatan state, about 2 1/2 hours inland from Cancun (including a rest stop at a tourist trap). The Mayan civilization flourished there from around 600 or 700 AD after choosing the site because of its excellent location for studying astronomy and such, and they came up with an amazingly accurate calendar, among other things-- it also held great religious significance. Over the centuries, the site was nearly abandoned and later repopulated by the Toltecs, who were thought to have influenced the architecture a fair bit (ie. the main pyramid standing today, the Pyramid of Kukulkan, is much wider than other Mayan pyramids like Tikal in Guatemala-- which was amazingly positioned at the magnetic north and captures the shadows exactly during the equinoxes and solstices). There's the tales of gory human sacrifices (though it was only every 52 years apparently), and then the eventual conquering of the site by the Spanish in the 1500s, where they dismantled many of Chichen Itza's structures and used the limestone to build churches. But the site was rediscovered in the 1800s by archaelogists and has been under looting and/or excavation since-- and luckily much more protected now.

That's one cool thing about revisiting places in the world-- how much even an ancient site can change over the years. When I first toured Chichen Itza in 1998, for one thing, climbing the Pyramid of Kukulkan was a must. 91 steep, hot steps to the top under the blazing sun... and a dizzying view down to the ground. For a few years now, that climb has been closed off-- too many idiots graffitiing the walls at the top, we're told. But with the number of tourists climbing that structure daily, surely it wouldn't be lasting for too long anyway.

There have been new discoveries and a bunch of new buildings excavated out of the ground since then too; the site has expanded quite a bit in 12 years. I can only imagine how much will have changed by the next time I'm back. There is one very bad development though-- the arrival of the high-profile music concert among the ruins. Sarah Brightman just did a show; before that, Pavarotti was there, and some other singers I think too; on April 3, Elton John will perform; and word is Paul McCartney's next. All great in concept, but even our guide Eduardo (who did his archaelogy Ph.D) was against the concerts-- because he shares the view that the intense noise of concert speakers is damaging the ancient structures more with every event (not to mention, has anyone SEEN what the ground looks like after an outdoor music festival?). So sad news there. Maybe someone will eventually shut that down....

So yes-- a good day of culture and history, with a few dashes of tourist-trap thrown in (think costumed Mayan dancers at our buffet lunch, dancing with a Corona bottle balanced so delicately on their heads). This time the tour had an additional stop at a cenote (a water-filled limestone sinkhole which the area is known for all throughout the jungle) for a swim-- sounded like a beautiful natural pool to take a dip in, but being surrounded by souvenir shops and landscaped with concrete steps and viewing platforms, not so natural wonder. Ah well! It's as natural as we can expect, I suppose. Gorgeous vines hanging all around though. And I'm sure if it wasn't a cool and cloudy day we would've been in that 150-ft deep pool in a flash!

(Fingers crossed the weather gets a bit better for our last two days-- boo hoo, you're probably thinking!-- as it's been getting cloudier and cooler with each passing day. At this rate we'll be coming back paler than we left. Anyhoo-- more updates soon!)

Cancun: it begins

2010-02-08T16:21:00.000+11:00

On our first morning in Cancun, a big blue sky and hot sun greeted us for our first voyage into town-- most of Cancun's hotels are located along a skinny strip of land that's separated from the mainland by a lagoon; the small downtown is just inland from that. It was time to try out the local buses, a few of which go straight to "Super Wal-Mart", where visiting gringoes and locals alike load up on groceries. At 7.5 pesos a trip (that's about 60 cents), it's a bargain and a fun ride. After an excellent Mexican breakfast of huevos rancheros at a local cafe, we wandered the extremely quiet town — realizing everything's closed because it's Sunday, duh! — and found our way to the Wal-Mart, which was a bit unlike Wal-Marts at home in that it had a big bakery of local pastries, a giant section of cheese, and tequila and beer on the shelves. Our suite's kitchen was soon well-stocked. Awesome!

The afternoon was lovely and the biggest debate was whether to spend our time by the pool or the beach. We opted for beach (as many people did) and relaxed by the stunning turquoise ocean to the tune of vendors honking on giant conch shells and small planes putting by, dragging Superbowl Party banners. Eventually it game time drew close, and since it appeared our TV channels were mostly in Spanish, we figured Planet Hollywood would be showing the game. We weren't wrong — and amazingly enough, the restaurant seemed well-divided between New Orleans and Indianapolis fans. Divided... yet very united in the crowd's universal love of football (even I learned a teeny bit about what was happening).

On Day 2 (Monday), we thought we'd break up what would likely be a whole week of loafing by the pool/beach with a Spanish lesson put on by the hotel. It was fun and we learned a few handy phrases (like "Es picante?"), but our small group of five adults soon found our Spanish skills shown up by the one nine-year-old kid in the group! Little did we know, the sun would mostly disappear after the Spanish lesson and only come out for short stints for each day afterward... ah well... at least we could practice our Spanish numbers in the many malls around! (And maybe make a few friends along the way...)

making friends ....

The Art of the Last-Minute Trip

2010-02-06T17:30:00.001+11:00

In a very strange turn of events this week (proving once again that life is full of 'big question marks'), our blog will return to being a travel blog for one random week — because, today, Dayle has found herself in Mexico.

Yup, you're reading correctly. I'm in Mexico!!!

In a nutshell, my parents had a week booked in Cancun starting today; however, earlier this week my grandfather ran into some serious health issues, landing him in the hospital and keeping my mother in Canada to look after him. So I'm subbing in... sort of a pinch hitter for vacations.

So yes — for this week, I'll be updating in between eating huevos rancheros and beach bumming. It'll be interesting: the first time I was in Cancun was my first time ever in Mexico, and even then it felt a bit like an extension of the U.S., and not so much like a foreign place. Hopefully it still carries a bit of the exotic, not too much Spring-Break vibe, but definitely some nice weather. It's also a bit weird travelling with such mixed emotions: sad my Mom couldn't come and that I've left behind my ill grandfather, feeling a bit irresponsible for leaving work at the drop of a hat, a giddiness that comes in waves that I'm going on an unexpected vacation, and a wee bit of doubt at how the more-cynical me will fare in such an easygoing, party-hard tourist town like Cancun after fighting my way through places like Burma and Jakarta.

So after a terribly crazy day and a half (I learned I was going on Thursday), I ended up in Waterloo with way too many clothes for the trip and spent all night repacking my old trusty NBought some hair dye just before the drugstore closed at midnight and packed that along with my nail polish and everything else to primp with when I arrived in Mexico — while some people get manicures and such before a trip, I didn't even have time to return my library books! After a super early morning and a smooth four-hour Air Canada flight (along with my Dad's adorably giddy assistant, who took the same flight as us to Cancun), we hopped off the plane today to clear skies and about 26 degrees... muy bien! A few hitches with our room not being ready on time, so we sleepily hit the poolside restaurant for some much-needed lunch and cervezas. Even if everything else is not the cheapest in touristy Cancun, beer is still a steal: two happy hour beers for 65 pesos ($5USD), even at the poshy hotel bar.

Eventually we got to our "villa", a really nice apartment-sized place in the monstrous and new Westin Lagunamar with views of the turquoise ocean and the gigantic hotel pool (biggest in Cancun, says my Dad). No luck on swimming today though; sun sets at 5:30pm and there's a cool breeze. But there will be plenty of time for that... Adios for now! I'll be back for more updates soon.

How Late is Too Late?

2010-01-31T13:51:00.008+11:00

Dead Christmas trees littered the curbside weeks ago. The candy canes disappeared from store shelves even before that. Suddenly it's the end of January and there's that niggling feeling that we should consult our calendar more often, and oh, just maybe, perhaps, TAKE DOWN OUR CHRISTMAS LIGHTS ALREADY!

The traditionalists reading this are probably wondering why we still have Christmas lights up on January 31st. Truthfully, they didn't take all that much effort to put up: there were no 20-foot ladders, feral animals in the eaves, or snow squalls to contend with, or anything like that. It was more like, untangle one strand of lights, get out the clear packing tape, and tape them up around the front window. On the inside. (One point for apartment living!) It's not like it'll be a massive effort to take them down.

But, we wonder, is there really a magic date to take down the Xmas lights?

After taking a very informal poll of opinions of those around us, we've heard some say that the beginning of March should be the very last deadline for Xmas lights still being socially acceptable (as it's pretty gloomy up to then, but spring is definitely on its way after that); others say February's when enough is enough; and there's the school of thought that Boxing Day is when it's all over for the lights. Not surprisingly, there's many opinions online about it too — including a Facebook group titled "Take Your Damn Christmas Lights Down". (The group has 97 fans.)

As people who haven't owned Christmas lights in a long time (OK, we did try to put some up inside our van back in Australia, but they tended to drain the car battery), getting back into these little nuances of northern hemisphere culture is still something we stumble over now and then. And we're a bit torn on the whole issue. Even if the Christmas cookies are eaten and the presents have been opened, it is still nice to come home after work to electric holiday cheer — though maybe it's more about denying that bitter, awful winter that has yet to come. Maybe the same sort of that seasonal denial that kept some of us (not naming any names here!) wearing flip-flops well into October. But after taking a visual poll of our street, we've found that at least four other houses are still proudly lighting their houses for Old St. Nick. So bah humbug that!
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OK, seriously though. How about you take our handy reader's poll and tell us what you really think, so we don't have to go consulting Yahoo! Answers or anything like that. Or Google, for that matter!

A Terrible Discovery

2010-01-24T05:39:00.006+11:00

It's kind of fun to live in the dark. This darkness I speak of, is being without television. Over the past few months we've been reading lots of books, getting our news from the internet, watching movies on our computers. Sure, we do have a TV set in the living room — it's huge and old and is hooked up to a DVD player: it's good for watching our small collection of movies, borrowed TV seasons, and DVDs borrowed from the library (Toronto Public Library has all kinds of films, from Hollywood bloodbaths like the new Rambo movie to seasons of Flight of the Conchords.... we love our library!). When the World Series was on in October, we flipped around our few fuzzy channels and found we couldn't get anything more than a very staticky Omni 1 and CBC, and some French channel with crystal clear reception. We didn't waste any more time on it — truthfully, we were sick of TV wasting all of our time over the years.

We always get this look of shock when the fact that we don't have cable television comes up in conversation. There's usually a look of pity, a pause, and a comment like "Well, that's probably a good thing..." or even better, "So what do you do with your time then?" Well, we spent 6 months in Southeast Asia without televisions (OK, occasionally we'd score a room with a TV showing Korean soaps, or surprisingly in Burma, we once had a room with a satellite news station from Australia), and managed to entertain ourselves just fine. Is there really nothing interesting enough happening in Canada worth turning off the telly for?

Or maybe it's just that sedate lifestyle of living in one place, working the same job for a long time, and hanging out with the same people that does it to us. We admit, even in Melbourne, when we got settled with an apartment, steady-ish jobs, and a city we knew well, we turned on the tube and zoned out in front of anything that was on. At that time in Australia, there was no such thing as cable TV, only satellite (expensive FoxTel) or antenna reception — even in the city you'd only pick up about five or six channels on air. We got hooked on some pretty crappy cop dramas, a Australian newscaster we liked to call "Space Granny" (see photo, left), and even watched some Aussie Rules Football. And we realized how in Toronto, we take for granted the many channels available, thanks to having that American entertainment juggernaut not far across the lake and well within reach of an antenna if your apartment's on a high enough floor. But television didn't seem to dominate Australian workplace conversations, either, which was kind of refreshing. Here we've been feeling left out.

Anyway, so on Monday night we realized that even after months of living without TV, we weren't ready to miss another season of 24 (we'd forgotten about the first episode on Sunday). Just for the hell of it, we thought we'd try to plug in a cable splitter and cord into the wall, and see if perhaps Rogers screwed up and had given us cable with our internet connection. Well, we didn't even get that far. Adrian attached a cable to the back of the TV set, a splitter onto that, and suddenly we had our channels clear as anything. We flipped around and found out we somehow get all the major networks, without even plugging into the wall. And happily watched Jack Bauer kick down some doors and yell at bad guys.

And there went our evenings. Suddenly, we know when the Law & Order reruns are on, we can rhyme off the weather forecasts, and we've learned Survivor's coming back soon with the villains and good guys. We even watched the Canadian Dragon's Den, which by the way, has anyone noticed the noise that animated dragon (that shows up before and after commercials) makes sounds less like a dragon and more like a strangled puppy? Last night I even watched Survivorman, a show I despise. Anyway, this whole TV thing is a bittersweet, possibly terrible discovery for us — yup, we're back in the loop, but has it really improved our (or anyone's) quality of life? I guess now we've truly settled back in.

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** Well, you learn something new every day! Apparently our beloved "Space Granny", Lee Lin Chin, has more than a few fans online. Here's A BLOG devoted to her oddball fashion sense; a few of her newscasting get-ups on Flickr (HERE and HERE), and according to Wikipedia, she once starred in an Aussie miniseries with Nicole Kidman. We miss you, Space Granny! Is there a Canadian equivalent??

The Office

2010-01-15T04:20:00.006+11:00

New year, new office. What better way to kickstart 2010 but with a little re-thinking of the apartment/home office?

With a couple of freelance gigs on the go for both of us, we've realized the need to make a better, more functional workspace at home to get our work done. The two of us plugging away on our laptops in the same room has been fun, but there's a lot of "Hey! Check out this cool Lego version of The Matrix!" and "Oh my god! I totally want this USB flash drive that looks like a slice of strawberry cake!" Not that these aren't totally awesome finds, but well... maybe it turns out we're really good at finding random cool things online and not getting our work done.

So it's an IKEA sort of lesson: making the most of your small living space. Though our apartment consists of only four rooms (kitchen, living room, bedroom, bathroom), we've managed to squeeze two more "rooms" out of it. By arranging furniture in little clusters, our apartment actually feels a lot bigger. Our living room has an area to relax in, with couch, TV, and coffee table. On another wall is a desk, with a computer and printer- our 'living room office'. We were lucky enough to inherit a desk already built into a bedroom wall, so with a little rearranging, it's no longer a a storage area for our art supply boxes and now a snazzy plant-filled workspace next to our big front window (great light too). It's even got a baseball autographed by former Blue Jays star third baseman, Kelly Gruber (thanks Neil!) for inspiration.

By the way, did anyone read about the recent shark attack in South Africa? "Longer than a minibus"? Yikes! We're glad we did our surfing lessons in Australia. OK, now back to work...